Boyfriends Are The Best Friends
by Rambutans
Summary: Wally and Dick decide it would be hilarious to troll the team (mostly Artemis) into thinking they are boyfriends. Then they maybe accidentally become actually boyfriends. Eventual Dick/Wally, but lets be real it's Dick/Wally the whole time.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors note shamelessly copy/pasted from tumblr**: I haven't decided if I want to add a plot beyond romance to this but I probably won't because then I will never finish it. So like I am guessing there will be maybe two or three more parts. It's likely there may be four. Five is also a possible outcome. Six is not unreasonable. Seven is unlikely.

Ugh why don't I have a 24/7 person to edit my things and tell me when my writing is great and when it is the worst because I CAN'T. TELL. Don't judge me, my moist play-dough heart would never be able to take it.

I am just kidding. Judge me please. Give me critiques if you so desire. I am a brittle brown leaf fallen from the sycamore in your backyard. Crush me beneath your worn winter boots. I am dust in the wind.

* * *

Wally loved his team-mates, really. Even Artemis - when she wasn't being a huge B - could be fun to hang with now and then. But that didn't mean he always shared their interests or passions, and as a result Movie Mondays were hard to sit through sometimes. Particularly when certain very grumpy, monkey hating individuals joined forces with certain laid back, oceanic fairing individuals and decided that 2001: A Space Odyssey was _the thing_ to watch.

Wally had been subjected to 2001: A Space Odyssey every single year on Barry's birthday since he moved in with Wally's Aunt Iris. How a speedster could stand to sit through that two-and-a-half hour excuse for a film, Wally would never know, and he could say with honest certainty that it was not _the thing_ to watch. Despite how vehemently Wally tried to communicate this to Conner and Kaldur, everyone - even Dick - insisted that it was a "classic" and therefore "worth a try", so Wally resigned himself to a night of agony and intense boredom at the hands of his friends' poor taste in movies.

By the time the overture was finally _over_, Wally expected his teammates to begin showing the classic signs of apathy, distaste, and disgust that went along with watching 2001: A Space odyssey, but Conner, who could often be found watching static when no one was in the rec area, looked enraptured, and Kaldur was sporting the same passive expression that he always did.

Artemis at least looked discontent, her head lolling back and forth in disbelief every now and then against the wing of her chair, and M'gann had been making more and more frequent excuses to check on her currently baking pie. Soon both of the girls would be down for the count and that just left Dick who, after the overture, had slumped against Wally's shoulder and whispered into his ear, "They should call it over_torture_."

It wasn't much, but Wally could work with it. If he timed things well, he could have the majority vote in favor of a movie switch by the time M'gann's pie was ready to chill. All he had to do was play his cards right.

Wally inclined his head towards Dick's and said, "Don't forget, Rob. You wanted to 'give it a shot', if I remember correctly."

"How was I supposed to know it would be this bad?" Dick said, shifting closer and lowering his voice. Wally wasn't sure why though, Kaldur may not have been able to hear them, but there was no point trying to keep Conner from listening.

"It just gets worse, I promise." Wally said.

"How can it get worse than this?" Dick motioned to the tv where actors in monkey suits who were supposed to look like hominids danced and flailed around a large obelisk.

"Do you really want to have to find-"

"Hey, lovebirds, quit talking. We can all hear you." Artemis turned in her chair and trapped them in the vice grip of her dark eyed stare.

Wally made a face at her. "Don't tell me you're enjoying this, Blondie."

"Look, it may not be my favorite, but you and your boyfriend wonder pick the movie almost every Monday. Give somebody else a chance."

Dick clutched Wally's arm between his hands and said, "Don't hate us 'cause you ain't us, Artemis. We're just fools in love."

For a few seconds, Artemis looked at them like she was trying to figure something out. Then she turned back around in her chair and muttered, "Doesn't mean you have to be dicks in love."

"Isn't that what boyfriends _are_?" Wally said.

Dick cackled and held out his fist for Wally to bump. "Nice one."

This provoked Artemis to face them again with a snarl creeping onto her lips. "Really, Wally? _Really_?"

"Perhaps," Kaldur's voice echoed loudly over the surround sound of the movie and it made Wally jump. "Those of us who are not enjoying the film should leave, so that those of us who are enjoying it _can _enjoy it."

"Oops," Dick said in a tone that seemed only half sincere.

Wally sunk into the cushions of the couch. "Sorry, man…"

Next to them, Artemis sighed and turned one last time to glare at Wally. For a moment he could almost hear the words _I'm not apologizing, this is your fault_ ringing through his head. Maybe Blondie was part Martian. He stuck his tongue out at her for good measure before she looked away.

After a bit, Wally leaned back over Dick's shoulder and said, "Dude that was an open invitation. Can we please skip this movie night?"

Dick watched the screen for barely half a second before he blinked and said, "Yeah okay, let's go."

+o+o+o+

Artemis may have stayed to watch 2001: A Space Disaster but Wally saw the wistful look in her eye when he and Dick got up to leave. Maybe he couldn't woo her into voting for a movie-swap, but he came close… sort of. At least he got Dick to leave with him.

"Dude, why does your room smell like febreze and B.O.?"

Wally glanced away from his computer to look at Dick who lay flat on Wally's bed, his nose scrunched up with his hands behind his head. "Um, what do you want me to do, open a window? In case you haven't noticed, we're inside a mountain."

Removing his sunglasses and setting them on Wally's night stand, Dick scooted off the bed. He exhaled something that sounded like a foreign language as he crossed Wally's room and then said, "That's what the vents are for." After a few moments of fiddling with the keypad next to Wally's door, a holographic interface sprang up, similar to the one on Robin's glove. The air ducts above Wally's head and on the other side of the room began to whirr and rattle, and Dick turned around with a smirk.

"Wow, okay. Not all of us are world class hackers, Dick."

Dick's smirk slipped into a frown. "Dude, _Secret ID_! And you don't have to be a world class hacker to turn on your vents - but I'm flattered anyway."

"What? You took off your shades!" Wally slouched against his pillows. The computer in his lap began to hum in time with his now airing vents - an attempt to reclaim Wally's waning attention, no doubt.

"Yeah, and You-Know-Who has super _hearing_." Dick gave Wally a scolding look and it was somehow not as scathing as usual. Dick's exposed eyes made him appear younger than he really was sometimes. Or maybe they just made him look as young as he actually was. Wally tried not to think about stuff like that.

"Wow, did you even look in this drawer when you got here before you started filling it with crap?" Dick said in reference to Wally's night table which housed a fraction of his superhero memorabilia - mostly just the things he couldn't fit in his room back home anymore.

"Hey! That's not crap. Some of that stuff is collectable." Wally said, eyeing Dick cautiously as he rifled through the drawer.

"Just because you can collect it doesn't mean it's not crap." Dick pulled a slightly scuffed Robin action figure out of the debris and smiled. "Cute." He set it on top of the table and then dove back in, this time emerging with a thin staple bound book which he tossed at Wally.

"What's this?"

"User manual for the room interface. If you actually read it, it's not that hard to operate." Dick climbed back onto the bed and flopped down next to Wally who was looking at the manual like it was a ticking bomb. "So did you notice Artemis totally thinks we're dating?"

Wally snorted. "Yeah. I can't believe she thought you were serous."

"I can't decide if it's astrous or _dis_astrous."

"Probably both," Wally flipped through the pages of the manual, skimming them at super speed as they fluttered in and out of his line of vision. "Dude! There's a TV in my room?"

"Behind the wall panels, yeah. It's meant for video calls from the league and stuff like that, but I can rig it to pick up cable if you want."

Dick yawned over Wally's emphatic pleas of, "I need it, please Rob, yes, oh my god."

"Okay. Give me a day or two to jack one of Batman's Xfinity cable boxes."

At the end of its usefulness, the manual was cast aside and Wally said to Dick, "You are the best friend ever," before returning his attentions to the laptop on his legs

"You are truly privileged to have me." Dick sat up and yawned again, then groaned in what Wally assumed to be disgust. It was not uncommon for Dick to complain about how much time a person wasted sleeping due to the rigorous insomniac influences of Batman. Despite this, Wally knew Dick to be almost unable to stay awake at night if he wasn't on patrol or otherwise engaged in heavily strenuous mental or physical activities. Dick considered it to be a character flaw but Wally just thought it was mostly funny.

"Boyfriend extraordinaire," Wally said and typed Super Mario Bros live action into google search.

Robin laughed. "We should totally screw with Artemis over that."

"We should screw with the whole team over it. Nobody said _anything_."

"Yeah, that was kind of weird." The bed bounced when Dick fell back against the mattress and huffed. "Are we going to watch a movie on your shitty computer or are we just going to talk about how the team thinks we're going out?"

"I'm trying to find a link!"

Dick craned his neck over Wally's arm to look at the screen and grimaced. "No, Wally. Not Super Mario Bros. That movie is a disaster, _extra_ heavy on the dis."

"Aw, come on. It's funny!"

"No. Give me that," Dick said and somehow reached both of his arms across Wally's stomach to type without sitting up.

"No rom coms, Rob. I'm serious."

"Dude, Super Mario Bros _is_ a rom com."

"No way. It's an action sci-fi comedy that appeals to gaming culture."

"Wow. No it's not." Dick said, striking the enter key inordinately hard.

Somehow while Wally had been trying to convince Dick that Super Mario Bros was a great movie filled with humorous value, Dick had already found an HD link to The Princess Bride, and Wally ended up watching Wesley wrestle with R.O.U.S.'s though half-lidded eyes before he fell asleep.

+o+o+o+

The artificial sun lights painted Wally's room in a dim yellow haze and he hated the way it pried his eyes open against their will. His laptop had migrated from his thighs to the edge of the bed during the night and he dragged it away from its dangerous perch and turned to Dick who had at some point cocooned himself beneath Wally's covers and left absolutely no blankets for Wally.

Currently, Dick seemed to be experiencing some sort of twitching episode - probably a nightmare. Wally knew better than to wake him up from it, so since he wasn't going back to sleep with Mount Justice's stupid automatic lighting clogging up his head with early morning instincts, he booted up his computer and waited for Dick to return to the land of the living.

One of Wally's hands was resting on the crown of Dick's head when Dick jerked awake, groaned, and slowly fumbled into a sitting position.

"You okay?" Wally asked, moving his hand away from the dented pillow where Dick's head had been.

"Ugh, yeah, I dreamed that batman fired me. Then he married Supes and they both quit being heroes and I had to read about it in a tabloid to find out."

Wally laughed. "Sounds great."

"It was amazing." Dick said and stared at Wally's poster covered wall behind half lidded eyes. Wally noted that Dick looked like a giant burrito with a head poking out one end the way he had all those blankets folded around him. It made Wally hungry. "Is that a Flying Graysons poster?" Dick asked.

Wally pulled his eyes away from Dick the Robin burrito and looked at the wall across from his bed. "Um, yes."

"Is it new?"

Out of habit, Wally's hand rubbed the short hairs on the base of his neck. "Sort of. I ordered it like three months ago, but it just came last month."

Dick raised an eyebrow. "You could have just asked me for one. I've got a bunch."

"Yeah, I mean." Wally rolled his shoulders and it turned into a shrug. "I don't know, I kind of thought of that but... it seemed like it would have been weird... or something. Maybe?"

Dick snorted. "It wouldn't have been weird. It's totally astrous that you have one, dude."

"It's okay that I put it up here and everything, right?"

"Yeah, just say you asked me to get it for you when we had that mission at Haley's or something if anybody asks." Dick yawned and finally stretched out of his blanket burrito, revealing a black t-shirt and yellow flash pajama pants that he had definitely not been wearing when they fell asleep. "I don't know why you always do nice stuff for me and then not tell me like you don't want me to know you did it. _That's_ weird."

The pajama's, Wally decided, were a great way to avoid having to respond to that statement, so Wally did the adult thing and ignored it. "Did you actually wake up in the middle of the night and make the conscious decision to steal my clothes?"

"Probably not." Dick rolled off the bed, landed on his hands and cartwheeled the rest of the way into a standing position.

"Those are my favorite pair of pj pants, dude."

The sunglasses that _had _been on Wally's nightstand appeared suddenly on Dick's face and he smirked. "Suck it. M'gann is probably re-warming her pie for breakfast you know."

Suddenly, Wally was over his pajamas crisis and across the room, standing next to Dick in front of his door. Wally's laptop, abandoned and tipped over on its side, watched him walk away with Dick. A silent beep of pain escaped its speakers as the door closed behind them.

Wally and Dick emerged from Wally's room as Artemis rounded the corner of the hall. Her hair was damp and done up in a bun to keep it from drenching the back of her Star City Stags jersey. She gave them both a pinched look that escalated into a frown when Dick's arms slithered around Wally's neck and he said, "Ugh, Wally why am I so _tired_."

Wally swallowed his initial reaction, which was to push Dick away and make whining baby noises about cooties. Instead, he slipped his hand into the pocket of Dick's (_Wally's_) pajama pants and said, "Dunno, dude. You hardly slept last night."

Artemis's eyes widened appropriately at this and she picked up her pace.

"You think _that's_ why?" Dick said and then groaned in a long, drawn out and painful manner.

"By the way, thanks for letting me borrow your pants, dude."

As Artemis passed, Dick let go of Wally and tugged his arm. They began following her toward the kitchen. "No problem, Rob. Not like you could have slept in _yours_."

"Yeah, that would have been majorly uncomfortable."

"Stop!" Artemis's hands flew to her ears and she hunched her shoulders. "Enough, I don't want to hear about it!"

Dick scoffed and it had a distinctly offended tone to it. "Don't be weird, Artemis. We're just talking about s-"

Artemis expelled a guttural cry and sprinted down the hall.

"Sleepovers," Dick finished.

Wally was laughing through his nose when Dick untangled their arms. "This is going to be great," he said.

Dick smirked. "What are you talking about, it's already great."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N** omg I'm sorry this took like a lot longer than I wanted it to to get out but my work and school schedule has been crazy messed up lately, so whatever holiday seasons, regular stuff, excuses etc. I'll try to get the next part out faster!

* * *

They were returning from a conference mission in Guam when Dick kissed Wally's cheek in front of the entire team.

Sometimes performing covert missions for the league also meant being the league's covert ambassadors, and detailing league protocol with the United States' rapidly growing military and naval training ranges in Guam happened to be one such instance of that. It had been one of the first few missions Batman actually let Robin lead on, and Dick wasn't sure if he should be excited or offended about it. They didn't get to see a lot of action, and dealing with the continually skeptical glances of military personnel grated on Dick's nerves more than he liked to admit, but at least they didn't come home sweaty and covered in gunpowder - or worse.

The mundane tedium of such a mission provided the perfect atmosphere for a scandalous kiss, so while M'gann was chatting to Kaldur about how beautiful the shores were in Guam, Dick walked up to Wally like he was going to fist bump or high five him. Instead, he leaned forward and aimed for Wally's cheek with his mouth. The peck hit its target, and Dick turned around before Wally could ruin it by sputtering something weird or stupid.

"Later guys," Dick said, picking up his pace as he made his way across the hangar.

"Are you leaving for somewhere, Robin?" Kaldur asked. He looked completely unfazed when Dick turned to answer him.

"Yeah, I gotta change and head back to Gotham for a debrief with Batman."

Kaldur's lips thinned and he said, "I wish you luck, then."

Dick laughed. "Thanks dude, I'll need it."

As he jogged towards the stairs, he heard Artemis's voice echo across the hanger. "You going to be okay there, Baywatch?"

So maybe that one had been more to screw with Wally than the team, but... Conner looked kind of disturbed. It was still a win.

+o+o+o+

Dick could hear Artemis in the kitchen, complaining about Wally's eating habits from all the way down the hall. As he entered the lounge in his freshly dawned civvies, he sent a parting wave to the team sans-Kaldur gathered around the kitchen island.

He got no response from Conner, but M'gann broke away from her chat with him to wave back and say, "Bye, Robin!"

It was at this acknowledgement of Dick's presence in the room that Wally abandoned his food - Dick had to do a double take to confirm that this was what actually happened - and cut Dick off before he reached the stairwell to the hanger.

"Hey, KF. What's up?" Dick crossed his arms and stared directly into Wally's eyes, sheltered behind the safety of his shades.

"Not cool, dude." Wally said. Across the room, Artemis watched them with pursed lips and narrow eyes. Wally glanced at her and then at his food before re-focusing on Dick.

"What specifically is 'not cool'?"

Wally mimicked Dick's stance. "You know what."

"Do I?" Dick had to bite his lip to keep from laughing at Wally's enraged expression.

"This is payback, dude. It is on."

Dick knew what was coming, but Wally was a speedster and so it came much faster than Dick had expected. By the time he was able to register Wally's slightly moist lips barely pressed against the tip of his nose, they were already gone.

In the kitchen, M'gann cooed something about how sweet they were and Dick resisted the urge to rub his nose. "Touché, that was grossly cute."

"I warned you."

Artemis groaned in the distance. "Do you guys have to this in front of everyone?"

"Boyfriends, Artemis!" Dick said.

M'gann gasped. "Are you really?" Next to her, Conner muttered something under his breath but Dick couldn't quite make it out.

"Have fun explaining this to Miss M." Dick said, smiling.

Wally's squinted and pursed his lips, then pushed Dick gently towards the staircase and said, "Go talk to Bats. We're through here." He sped back to his food and shot Dick a look somewhere between annoyance and pride.

"Bye, Wally!" Dick called as he descended the stairs, using his best impression of the tipsy girls Bruce sometimes brought home after banquets.

+o+o+o+

The batcave was empty. Some small part of Dick couldn't help but think he should have known this would happen. He came out of the zeta-beam in front of the central computer where he had expected to see Bruce hunched in his chair, brooding over cases while his thick fingers _click click clicked_ away on the interface keyboard. Instead, he saw a blank screen and a worn, empty leather seat. There were no _clicks_ except for the echo of water dripping from the limestone ceiling and the flutter of batwings beating in the shadows.

A quick scan of the cave on his wrist computer proved Dick right. No one was there but him, and, apparently, Alfred whose heat signature had just appeared at the top of the stairwell leading up to Bruce's study.

The batmobile still sat perfectly content on its hydraulic turntable as Dick strode past it, so he could probably rule out any mid-day crises in Gotham as the cause of Bruce's absence.

He met Alfred halfway up the stairs and tried to fight the scowl that was creeping down the corner of his lips.

"Ah, Master Dick, I was just on my way to meet you." Alfred's age wearied face crinkled up into a smile and Dick set aside his irritation at Bruce to return it, albeit halfheartedly. "Your mission went well, I take it?" Alfred said, turning as Dick passed him to walk back up the stairs.

"I wouldn't even call it a mission, Alf, more like a glorified lecture and demonstration. But, yeah it was fine."

Alfred hummed and clasped his hands behind his back. They walked in silence up the dimly lit staircase while Dick eyed the moist stalactite hanging above them. When they finally neared the backside of Bruce's grandfather clock, Alfred said, "I imagine you're wondering where Master Bruce is?"

A pent up groan escaped Dick's lips. "Yes! He should be here. How am I supposed to prove to him that I can lead the team if he isn't even here when he's supposed to be to debrief with me?"

The corner of Alfred's mouth moved upward and Dick swore he saw Alfred's moustache twitch. "He's been kept otherwise occupied by a rather urgent meeting with the board of directors at Wayne Enterprises. He called earlier to offer you his sincerest apologies, and promises he'll be home soon."

"Urgent, huh?" Dick grumbled, stepping through the opening into Bruce's study.

"Quite." Alfred set a knobby hand on Dick's shoulder and said, "Try not to hold it against him. He is doing the best he can."

"Yeah, sure," Dick sighed.

"In the meantime, might I suggest catching up on some of the school work you've fallen behind on recently?"

"Ugh." Dick turned his head to the side to glare at Bruce's mahogany desk and the rolling suede chair behind it. Trigonometry was one thing, he could get down with trigonometry, but all of the business classes Bruce had been forcing him to take recently were killing him.

Alfred gave his shoulder one last pat, returning Dick's attention to the smiling face above him. "Dinner will be ready at seven, sharp, Master Dick. Don't be late."

+o+o+o+

Dinner was sliced beef with au jus and a green bean salad. Dick could smell the broiling sauces and roasting meat wafting up through the vents in his room at a quarter to seven, and he knew if he wasn't down there on the hour, Alfred would be after him with cutlery in his hands. That was something Dick didn't like to see or think about, so he called it quits on his principles of marketing essay and made for the downstairs dining room.

Alfred came out with a pre-dished plate and set it down on Dick's white lace place mat. "Here you are. Master Bruce called several minutes ago to let you know he would be home shortly. When you're finished eating, you may go meet him in the cave to conclude your debriefing."

"When I'm finished?" Dick said, forcing the whine from his tone as he speared a slice of meet.

"Yes."

"Can't I just eat in the cave?" Dick asked.

He knew he had said the wrong thing when Alfred's already age thinned eyes thinned even further. "No, you certainly may not." If there was ever a tone of voice that could put the fear of God into Batman, Dick was sure Alfred not only knew how to use it, but very probably invented it. "You may not be aware of this, but the table at which you are currently seated, Master Richard, is one of three tables in Wayne Manor specifically commissioned by Thomas Wayne himself in nineteen-eighty-one to be the centerpieces of the rooms in which they are placed. I do believe it would be a heinous disservice to its craftsman, whose time and passion went into its making, and to Master Thomas, for you to abandon it in favor of eating in a cave."

Dick waited a time to make sure Alfred was actually finished with his lecture and then said, "Okay, okay, sorry. I'll eat at the table..."

Alfred took a breath. "Very good, I will inform Master Bruce of your imminent briefing upon his arrival. Do enjoy the meal, Master Dick." Then Alfred turned and walked back through the swinging doors that lead into the kitchen.

+o+o+o+

When Dick got to the cave after narrowly escaping Alfred's discovery of his only half-eaten meal, Bruce was hovering in front of the three screen mainframe computer, already fully decked out in his cape and cowl. Superman's chiseled face and perfectly coiffed hair had just disappeared as Bruce's parting words of "I'm on my way," resounded through the cave.

Dick felt his fingernails digging into the skin of his palms. "Where are you going?" he asked.

Bruce turned and started toward the stairs that lead to the zeta-beam on the lower floor. "Emergency meeting with the league."

As Bruce passed him, Dick spun around, ghosting behind Bruce's cape like a second shadow. "What about my debriefing? I _did _lead a mission today, you know, kind of a big deal."

"We'll have it when I return. In the meantime, you can write your report."

"When exactly are you planning to return? Last time you had an emergency meeting with the league, it segued into a mission and you were gone for a week!"

"Dick," Bruce halted and turned. Dick nearly stumbled backwards, but he managed to keep his ground and meet Bruce eye to white optic lens. "I'll be back soon. Three hours at the most, I promise."

For a moment, Dick stared at him. He knew he was pouting. He was consciously aware of the way his cheeks puffed and his lips pursed, but Dick couldn't quite bring himself to stop. "I'm timing you. Three hours."

Bruce smiled one of his _Bruce_ smiles and it looked weird and disturbing from behind the cowl, but Dick got the message anyway. "It's a deal," he said. Dick put a lot of effort into rooting himself on the staircase and not following Bruce all the way to the zeta-beam. Instead, he trotted back up to the main computer and curled himself into the enormous chair. If he was going to be write this mission report for three hours, he was going to make it as specific and god awfully boring as he possibly could.

+o+o+o+

Sometimes Dick wondered what other people thought of Bruce, because, from a distance, on camera or in a newspaper clipping, Bruce looked like a handsome, still fairly young, well-built man. But up close, everything about him seemed just a little bit crooked. The corner of his mouth slipped slightly downwards when he talked due one too many right hooks. His nose leaned a bit to the left, his eyes weren't quite centered, and one squinted just barely sometimes, and when Dick got a look at his hands, there wasn't a single straight finger to be found. The weird thing was, when Bruce smiled his whole face seemed to even out and re-align into perfect symmetry.

This made it hard for Dick launch into a lecture about keeping promises when Bruce entered the cave exactly three hours and twenty-three minutes after he had left with a small, but solid, smile and his cowl hanging from his fingertips.

"I want to talk," Bruce said and put a large, gloved hand on Dick's shoulder.

Slowly, Dick swiveled around in his chair, narrowing his eyes in a practiced expression that he learned from Bruce himself. "Are we going to talk about the debriefing?" Dick asked.

Bruce's mouth twitched once and then tightened. "No. This is about something else."

Dick stared at him, unsure if he should break out into enraged screaming or simply never speak to Bruce again.

After almost a minute of silence, Bruce relented. "Don't worry. We'll debrief later, but I think this is more important right now."

"Are you sure it's more important, or do you just think it is?" Dick asked.

At this, Bruce smiled and said, "I'm sure. Why don't you go upstairs and wait for me in the study. I'll be up in a minute."

"I'm timing you," Dick said, scooting off of the chair.

"Make it six minutes, then."

+o+o+o+

Dick was slouched in one of the two wingback chairs in front of Bruce's desk when he heard the grandfather clock groan open and then shut behind him. Bruce walked around the desk with a disturbing look on his face. It was the same look that he had worn when he found out Dick had told Wally his ID and varied only because was less murderous. After a few silent seconds of Bruce tapping away on the keyboard of his computer and several poignant clicks of his mouse, he beckoned Dick to come around the desk and look at the screen. What Dick saw flushed all of the feeling from his body and left him more or less immobile.

There was Dick, sauntering up to Wally in the hanger at Mt. Justice, the two of them surrounded by the Team; and there was Dick, shoving his mouth against Wally's cheek from an aerial perspective. In the recesses of his mind, Dick felt mildly unnerved at how he _pranced_, but it was a waning thought, squashed when Bruce paused the video on Wally's wide eyed gape.

"Before you ask, Red Tornado was the one who informed me of this." Bruce minimized the image, and opened another video. Dick knew what it was before it even started playing. The second exchange detailed Wally's gross nose-kiss and when it too was over, Bruce leaned back in his chair and the spring creaked in its base like old wood.

"You can sit down, Dick." Bruce said when Dick failed to move back around the desk.

Dick swallowed and stumbled to the nearest chair.

"Why didn't you tell me about this?"

Dick studied Bruce's face but as long as he looked he couldn't tell if Bruce was mad or concerned or curious or what. "Um,"

"Never mind," Bruce said before Dick could even begin to weave a coherent response. "That really doesn't matter. How long have you and Wally been... in a relationship of this nature?"

"Uh..." Behind Dick's foggy gaze, his brain was working overtime weighing the pros and cons of telling Bruce the truth verses a lie. On the one hand, Bruce's indifference towards Dick's penchant for pranking had turned into a vendetta as soon as Dick's pranks had turned on _him_. He highly doubted that Bruce would approve of him and Wally lying to the team about being boyfriends just for "shits and giggles". On the other hand, if Dick told Bruce that he and Wally were boyfriends, that could bring about an entirely new layer of complications to an already pretty complicated prank. Although... if Bruce thought that Dick liked Wally like... _that_, he probably wouldn't have to dance with the snotty girls at Wayne Enterprises' many fundraiser parties. Hell, maybe Bruce would even let Dick invite _Wally _to those fundraiser parties.

That pretty much settled it. "A few weeks? I-I was going to tell you I swear! I-we just wanted... um, to make sure it was... you know, serious?"

Bruce stared at him for a moment and Dick could feel the lie detector blinking behind Bruce's eyes before he nodded. "I'm trusting that you don't need any advice from me about this?"

"I uh... don't think so."

"Good."

Dick waited for Bruce to add some final jab or bitter note, but there was just silence and the orange glow of Bruce's desk lamp. "You're… okay with this, right?" Dick asked.

"As much as I may not be head of the Kid Flash fan club, Wally has never been anything but a good friend to you. I don't have a reason _not_ to be okay with your relationship with him. I do, however, want to speak with him about it."

Dick expelled a very long breath and fell back into the chair. "He's going to love to hear that..."

A smile crossed Bruce's lips and he leaned over the desk with his fingers woven together. "I'll let you break the news to him."

+o+o+o+

When Dick texted Wally asking where he was and Wally texted back saying he was at Mt. Justice, Dick had anticipated a nice, quiet confrontation about the recently transpired events of the previous night. He was still miffed about the fact that Batman had managed to put off their debriefing for almost twenty-four entire hours, and he wasn't too keen about dropping this bombshell on Wally, so he was less than pleased when he entered the lounge to see entire team - even Zatanna - sitting around the small table by the kitchen. All of the furniture had been moved around so everyone could fit and Dick stood at the precipice of the circle with his arms over his chest and his eyes trained on Wally who sat sideways across the far chair with his head hanging off of one arm rest and his legs swing over the other.

Wally noticed him immediately, crying out, "Rob!" and turning the heads of the rest of the team.

"Robin!" M'gann floated an inch above the couch, a hand of cards held loosely between her fingers. "You came just in time. We're only two rounds in!"

"Would you like to join us?" Kaldur asked, his head popping around the back of the chair nearest to Dick.

"We're playing Apples to Apples," Zee said and sent Dick a fluttery smile.  
Dick smirked back at her. "Sounds astrous, but I need to talk to KF first."

"I'm right here, dude," Wally said, gripping the back of his chair and pulling himself into an upright position.

"In private," Dick said.

"Nothing's private with Supey around." Wally got a dirty look from Conner for that comment, but he didn't seem to notice.

Dick wasn't in the mood to make a scene so he shot Wally a frown and said, "Fine it can wait until later, then. Where am I supposed to sit?"

"Oh, I can get you a chair..." M'gann's offer trailed off as Wally patted his legs and grinned. A pale pink blush clouded her green cheeks and she floated back down the couch and giggled, "I guess you don't need one..."

When Dick didn't do anything but stare, Wally wriggled his eyebrows and said, "Right here, Babybird. Best seat in the house."

Artemis groaned and covered her eyes with her cards.

Instead of punching Wally for the hideous nickname and the absurd attempt at flirting, Dick walked around the table and leapt sideways onto Wally's lap, landing as hard as he could. Dick cackled when Wally wheezed and leaned forward only to bump his head on Dick's jaw. "Not cool, dude..." the words fell from Wally's mouth in a withering breath.

Dick patted him on the shoulder and said, "You asked for it, literally."

"You can see each other's cards..." Conner said and Dick turned to him. "Isn't that cheating?"

"I don't have any cards, Supey." Dick held up his empty hands and flinched when Wally sat up and curled his arm around Dick's side.

"Yeah we're playing on the same team, dude."

Artemis laughed. "We know _that_, Wally."

"_Ni-ice_!" Dick leaned over Wally and held his fist out to Artemis.

"No!" Wally grabbed Dick around the ribs and pulled him back, cards still clutched between his fingers, digging into Dick's chest. "Don't fist-bump her, dude!"

Dick wriggled halfheartedly against Wally's grip and Artemis stood up and lazily bumped her knuckles against Dick's fist while Wally was trying to contain him. A quiet whine escaped Wally when he realized what had transpired and his arms slackened. Dick laughed.

"Can we just play?" Conner said.

"Yeah, yeah, what's the word?" Wally leaned back in the chair and pulled Dick with him, fanning out his cards in front of them for Dick to see.

"Electrifying," Kaldur said, across the table.

Dick moved sideways to sit diagonally across Wally's lap and nodded when Wally pointed to the Electric Eel card. "We really need to talk, KF." Dick could feel Wally shudder behind him when he whispered in Wally's ear. He blew cold air on Wally's neck afterwards and got a second shudder for his effort and an elbow in the side when Wally leaned forward to lay their card on the table.

"Cut it out dude. What do we '_really'_ need to talk about?" Wally whispered back.

"This isn't easy to say..." Kaldur was taking his sweet time explaining all of his reasons for choosing one card over another and Dick kept his eyes on the Kaldur's tanned hands as they picked up each word.

"Well don't drag it out..."

Dick took a deep breath and then leaned against Wally, wrapping his arms around Wally's neck and resting his forehead against Wally's temple. "Red Tornado gave Batman security footage from the cave and he saw our fake boyfriend activities and now he thinks we're dating and wants to talk to you about it."

All movement from Wally ceased and Dick hadn't actually been aware that Wally _was_ moving until now. There was no restless, bouncing leg, or flipping cards or drumming fingers; just complete stillness.

"I have to go to pee!" Wally sprang forward and Dick nearly fell out of the chair but caught himself on the edge of the table.

"Wonderful..." Artemis said.

"Dude!"

"Rob has to go too!" He grabbed Dick's wrist and pulled. Tossing his cards carelessly on the table, half of them face up, Wally sped from the room dragging Dick behind him.

"Can you slow down?" Dick said. He was struggling to keep up and Wally just kept running, turning down the halls left, then right until they burst into the library.

The abrupt stop caused Dick to slam into Wally's back but Wally only stumbled slightly forward, his eyes scanning the area. Dick didn't know why because Red Tornado had left that morning for a mission with the league and _everyone_ else was in the lounge. When Wally seemed satisfied that no one was in the library besides them, he turned to Dick with an unusually blank expression and said, "You have to tell him we're not really dating."

"Are you kidding me?" Dick said. "He would freak! You remember how mad he was about Nic? No way. We're not telling him this is all just a prank."

"Oh God... okay... okay, fine." Wally's shaking hand came up to twist at the neck of his shirt. "Should I fake my death now, or wait a few days to avoid suspicion?"

"Really?" Dick said. Wally just stared at him and Dick closed his eyes, combing his bangs back with his fingers. "You shouldn't do either of those things. Batman would find you no matter where you went."

"Then what should I do?" Wally hissed.

"Look, Wally, I know this is totally distressing for you, but I really don't think he's even that mad about it. He seemed pretty whelmed when I talked to him." Dick's bangs flopped back into place and he had to brush them to the side again to get them out of his eyes.

Meanwhile, Wally made a high-pitched whining noise and Dick wasn't sure if it came from his mouth or if it was a result of the fact that he had begun to _vibrate_ visibly.

"Dude, _calm down_. It's not like he saw you bone me or something!" Wally squeaked at that but Dick ignored him. "If he was going to actually maim you he wouldn't have warned me about it, and he definitely wouldn't have told me to break the news to you."

"A-are you sure?"

"Positive. Just be cheesy and sound really over protective, but _not_ possessive, and you'll be fine."

After taking a deep breath, Wally said, "Okay... okay... oh God, Rob I need a hug..." He put on a wide-eyed pout and held out his arms, stumbling into Dick before he could even respond.

Wally's body was still humming slightly against Dick's chest and he laughed at the feeling of it and patted Wally's back, "You'll be fine, dude. Just don't act natural."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** (yeah I totally copied this from tumblr) I sort of rushed the end of this one, so I'm not 100% on whether or not I'm ok with it? There is a chance I might change it a bit later, but tbh I probably won't because lets be real I am a very lazy individual.

* * *

Being a superhero, Wally had done some pretty scary stuff in his so-far short life - hell, he started his sidekick career by blowing himself up, that had to be worth more than a few points for courage - but somehow, Wally didn't think he'd ever experienced the ice cold terror that stuck to his limbs like a frost as he began the long walk through Wayne Manor to Bruce's study.

Dick was holding his hand, whether for moral guidance or to keep up appearances, Wally didn't know, but it was probably the only time he could remember that Dick's hand was warmer than his and, honestly, he welcomed the support.

"Dude, you're vibrating again. Would you get traught, already?"

"I can't help it this is the worst thing that's ever happened to me! canwepleasetellhimwebrokeupo rsoemthing? Pleasedickpleasepleaseplease !" Wally whined and tugged on Dick's hand, digging his heels into the plush red carpet of Wayne Manor's staircase. He pulled them both to a hault on the third step.

Dick spun around and stared at him with eyes that were as wide as Alfred's Thanksgiving dinner plates, but filled with rage instead of moist and tender turkey. "Wally, you're going to talk to Bruce. You're going to tell him you cherish me and that I am the best thing that's ever happened to you. You're going to tell him you'd take a bullet for me if you had to-"

"Dude I have taken a bullet for you. This is so much worse than that was!"

Dick frowned. "You have?"

"You don't remember?" Wally exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air only to realize that he was still holding onto Dick's. He received an unimpressed expression when he lifted Dick's hand up with his own. Wally coughed and lowered his arms.

"When did that happen?" Dick asked. Wally didn't miss the way Dick began to tug him slowly up the stairs again.

"I don't know like a year ago? Dude I took it straight in the hand. I was complaining about it for weeks, how can you not remember that?"

Dick shrugged. "I don't know, you are a speedster, I probably didn't even know you took it for me."

"I kept telling you you owed me a life debt! I made you buy me like four new games and a new phone!"

Dick stood still on the landing, peering past Wally at the entrance way beneath them. "That's what that was about?"

"Oh my God!"

"No, no," Dick held up his hand to silence Wally. "This is good. You can use this when he asks you if you'd give your life for me in the heat of battle."

Wally felt his knees begin vibrating. "He's going to ask me that?" he squeaked.

"I don't know, maybe, but get going!" Dick pulled on his hand and they started up the second set of stairs, though Wally held onto the banister to slow them down as much as possible. "He'll think you're weak if we dawdle too long."

"He'll think I'm weak?"

"Would you stop repeating everything I say in disbelief and just come on?" At this point, Dick was dragging Wally up the stairs completely by force. "Just get this over with and then we can head back to your place before I have to go on patrol tonight." Once they reached the top and Dick turned down the hallway, Wally didn't have the banister to hang onto anymore and grabbing the legs of hallway tables seemed to be taking it just a little too far so he settled for making anxious whining noises.

"Cut it out," Dick hissed and squeezed his hand so hard Wally thought his bones might break. "He'll hear you!"

They stopped in front of the double doors, huge and wooden and carved with an intricate anthemion pattern growing up them, at the end of the hallway. Wally took a deep breath, then another, and another, and after that, he took another breath. Dick scoffed and shoved him aside, letting go of his hand and knocking loudly on the door.

"You're welcome," Dick muttered, he took Wally's hand again just as Bruce's hulking frame appeared in the opened doorway.

Dick beamed up at his mentor, elbowing Wally in the side when he failed to acknowledge Bruce.

"H-hi, hello... Sir," Wally stared at Bruce's thick neck to avoid having to meet his eyes. "Um, Dick said I should-or I mean, that-"

"Come on in, Wally." Bruce said, wearing a small smile that made Wally's stomach flip and then careen to the ground just like the omelet he had tried to make for breakfast earlier that morning.

"Uh, yes, Sir."

"I'll be right out here, dude." Dick said. He gave Wally's shoulder a pat, then leaned forward and planted a particularly moist and loud kiss on Wally's cheek. When Wally's eyes refocused, a nasty frown settled into view on Bruce's face and Wally had to hold his breath to keep from whimpering. Dick laughed somewhere behind him and Bruce motioned for Wally to enter his study.

"So," Bruce's voice was placid as he closed the door behind him. "I'm told that taking your friendship with Dick to a romantic level was your idea?"

"Uh, yeah..." Wally tried hard to make the quiver in his voice sound like bashful embarrassment. He was pretty sure he had the nervous part down, but he didn't know if he could fake the blush.

Bruce sat down on the far side of his desk and Wally took that as his cue to sit in one of the wing-back chairs. "What was it that prompted this idea?" Bruce leaned forward slowly, drawing a long groan from his chair.

"What do you mean?" Wally asked, because he couldn't exactly tell Bruce that it was an offhanded comment Artemis made.

Somehow Wally didn't think that had been the right thing to ask, because Bruce's eyes narrowed and he made a show of lacing his fingers together over the desk. "What is it about Dick that made you think you wanted to be in a relationship with him?"

"O-oh," Wally didn't like the way that question was phrased. He could almost feel Bruce doubting the sincerity of his 'feelings'. It was the world's greatest detective he was trying to blatantly lie to, here. "Well, I guess it's... um" Why had he let Dick lure him into a false sense of confidence. He couldn't do this. It would be easier to fool a lie detector test than the Batman. "The... same things that made me want to be friends... with him?"

Bruce leaned forward and gave Wally a small, reassuring smile, but the only thing that Wally felt reassured of was Bruce's intolerance for crime and by extension liars who pretended to date his ward. "What exactly are those things, Wally?"

"Oh, um," this was getting down to the wire and Wally had to wrack his brain for reasons why he was friends with Dick that didn't fall under the category of 'we pull pranks together' and 'we both like video games'. Wally put his hands on his knees to keep them from bouncing and said, "he's... well, okay sometimes, he's funny. And he's pretty, like... brave and stuff. And he's well centered in himself, I mean, he's not psycho. He takes care of his baggage. I don't know, yeah. I just admire him a lot, I guess... not just as a hero but, like, as a person too because of where he comes from and his background and stuff."

Bruce's smile seemed less hostile by the time Wally finished, but Wally could just feel Dick's ear pressed up against the door to the study and he sunk into his seat a little at the thought of how long it was going to take for him to live this down.

"You've always been one of Dick's closest friends," Bruce said and Wally had to bite his tongue to keep from informing Bruce that he was Dick's single, best friend. "And while I can't say I saw this coming, as long as you are as good a partner to him as you have been a friend, I have no issue with you dating him."

"W-wait," Wally's hands clutched the arms of his chair. "That's it, that's your blessing, I have it?"

Bruce barely finished nodding before Wally expelled an emphatic, "YES!" and vaulted out of his seat, punching the air.

The tentative smile on Bruce's lips faltered, but he stood and moved around the desk, placing a hand on Wally's shoulder. "As much as I hate to cut this meeting short, I do have work to do, Wally, and I think Dick is waiting for you out in the hall."

"Hoo-oh, yeah," Wally stumbled around the chair under the force of Bruce's guiding hand and sped up as Bruce led him out to escape the imposing, heavy palm of Batman on his heels.

Dick was waiting for them outside, sitting on one of the hallway tables, legs swinging back and forth.

"Get off the table, Dick." Bruce's tone sent shivers down Wally's neck, but Dick just laughed and hopped onto the thin Persian rug. "Here," Wally barely caught the golden gleam of Wayne Enterprises etched onto the thin plastic card that Bruce handed to Dick. "Why don't you take the night off. I'm sure there's at least one buffet in Gotham that still serves Speedsters after Barry's last visit."

Something like a quivering gasp came out of Wally while Dick took the card with silent pursed lips. "How much is on here?"

"Enough."

Dick hmphed as Bruce retreated into his office with a curt goodbye. When the double doors closed, Wally pinned Dick with a heated stare and hissed, "You better not have been listening in."

"Hmm, me?" Dick didn't even bother to meet the stare, inspecting the debit card in his hands instead as he started down the hallway, back towards the staircase. "I probably wasn't. Ugh, I can't believe I'm going to miss patrol tonight to watch you stuff your face at some cheap buffet."

"Dude... I took a bullet for you, it better not be cheap."

+o+o+o+

Dick took Wally to an old, family run Italian buffet in uptown Gotham. Ladder-back chairs and a barrel vaulted ceiling with dusty maroon curtains to shade the late afternoon sun made this place prime picking for a mafia restaurant front, except with none of the customers. It was nearly five o'clock and every single chair was empty.

Wally gave Dick a concerned look as a stout middle aged woman carrying a pair of menus waddled toward them. "What is with this place?" he asked, after they had been seated.

Dick eyed the hostess across the room as she whispered heatedly at a gangly looking boy around Wally's age before shoving him out of the kitchen with two glasses of water in each hand. Wally slouched in his seat and sighed while Dick waited for the boy to deposit their drinks and thank them for their patronage. When he finally left, Wally latched onto the straw in his water like a lifeline and Dick said, "They've been having a hard time since Joker decided to play Mrs. Lovett with their ground beef shipments."

Wally choked on his water loud enough to make the hostess pop her head out of the swinging kitchen door. "You mean-"

"Yes, and I know where you're going with this, don't even say it. Wayne Enterprises has been paying for their meat ever since; all free range, grass fed, premium cut stuff so don't worry. I just thought they could use the business. Plus, since no one's here, I'm you're only competition for the buffet line."

Wally didn't stay to hear the end of Dick's speech and the last few words fell out of earshot when he sped towards the buffet tables. As long as the pasta didn't have human meat balls in it, Wally didn't care what it was made of.

The first table was filled with tins of steaming pasta noodles; shell pasta, fettuccini, penne pasta, manicotti and rigatoni, bow ties, and at the very end, tortellini and ravioli filled with every kind of real meat and fake meat Wally could imagine (except, of course, human). If Wally hadn't been so busy filling a plate with each kind of noodle, and mix and matching the sauces at the end of the counter, he might have fainted from the sight and the smell alone.

In the corner of his blurred peripheral vision, Wally was vaguely aware of Dick moving at what seemed like a snail's pace toward the pasta buffet while Wally went onto the bakery, meat dish buffet, and salad bar. When he had finally finished gathering all of his plates and depositing them at their table, there was absolutely no space left for Dick's, but Wally was confident he could polish off a few entrees while he waited for Dick to mosey back to the table. By the time Dick sat down, Wally had cleared two plates, and left enough room for Dick's humble bowl of fettuccini alfredo, although he had to hold his side salad in his lap.

Wally was half way through his fourth plate when Dick said casually between forkfuls of pasta, "So Bruce told me you think I'm brave and not psycho."

A mournful and high pitched wallow escaped Wally's mouth along with a bit of half chewed pasta. He struggled to swallow while Dick laughed at him and then stuck his fork straight up in a nest of noodles and said, "I knew it! I knew you were listening! Dude… not cool."

Dick looked anything but guilty. "What? I was right outside the door. Even if I hadn't wanted to, I would have been able to hear you."

Wally sent him a bitter, long suffering look, and then mumbled, "You've ruined it, man. I don't trust you at all anymore." He stuffed a forkful of pasta in his mouth and said, "I ding we dould breag up."

Dick snorted into his water class. "I'm sorry what did you say? I couldn't hear you over all those wet noodles in your mouth."

"DUDE!" Wally swallowed. "What does that even mean?"

Dick shrugged. "Honestly you should be thanking me." He leaned back in the red leather booth with a smirk on his lips, drumming his fingers on the edge of the table. "If Bruce hadn't known I was right outside, he probably would have tied you up and left you in the closet. And when you died of starvation, he'd say it was justice that killed you."

Wally growled over another mouthful of food. When he had finished chewing he said, "Only because you kissed my naked cheek right in front of him!"

"It was a necessary sacrifice for the sake of the mission." Dick said.

"Are you serious...?"

"Besides, you were wearing your freckles, it wasn't a naked cheek." Dick took a stab at the salad in his lap.

Wally frowned around his fork. "They don't come off, dude."

"I know," Dick said. "That's why I kissed one of them." He smiled in an innocent sort of way that made Wally feel like he was going to throw up.

The nausea left as soon as he glanced down at his food, but the uneasiness lingered and Wally said, "Whatever, you're weird," and began to climb his pasta mountains at super speed.

It worked out such that Wally managed to finish all of his food at nearly the same time that Dick finished his salad and alfredo. When the hostess came by with three waiters to help her clear off the table and a nice, long bill, she turned to Wally and thanked him at least three times, staring him straight in the eye, with one hand on his shoulder and the other braced against the table like she was afraid he might pass out or go into cardiac arrest at any moment. When she walked away with the card, Dick mumbled something about thanking the guy who paid. Wally laughed at him and got the finger for his efforts.

"Always a pleasure to get the bird from _the_ bird." he said.

+o+o+o+

Wally had his hands in his pockets and his shoulders hunched as he followed Dick down yet another city block of concrete lined roads. A plethora of personality types waltzed past them as Dick parted the sea of Gotham's midday crew of pencil pushers, freshly off shift and eager to get home. Wally had to side step out of one particularly rotund man's way. He was wearing an unusually shiny blue suit and barreled down the sidewalk in the opposite direction like a human steam roller.

"Where are we going?" He whined, turning his head away from the man and back to the perfectly trimmed hairline at the nape of Dick's neck. "We've been walking for hours..."

"It's barely been half an hour, dude." Dick turned around to send him a brief look. "And we're going back to your place, remember?"

"Are we going to walk there, because if we are-"

"Yep." Dick stopped at the mouth of an alley and turned down it. Wally saw the red out of order phone booth tucked into the corner of two brick buildings and a dumpster instantly, and he heaved a sigh of relief.

"I thought this one only went to the cave?" He said, standing in front of Dick to block the holographic keyboard that had popped up across one of the booth's windows from potential prying eyes on the main street.

"Well, it's only supposed to go to the cave." Dick said and laughed quietly, like this was some inside joke he had with himself.

Wally crossed his arms. "Seriously dude. I worry about you sometimes." Dick only laughed louder and then opened the phone booth door for Wally. "If this thing spits me out in Antarctica, Dick, I swear..."

Dick's lips curled into a thin smile and he hummed a little laugh. "Come on, Wally. I never pull the same prank twice, you know that."

Wally grumbled something that probably wasn't actual words under his breath and stepped into the phone booth. The familiar tingle of having his molecules disassembled crept down his arms and legs while the identifier spoke his name and number through the tiny phone receiver. Wally wondered every time he went through a zeta beam if this was what it felt like to vibrate his molecules through things, but he never actually asked The Flash about it. When the tingling stopped and his vision cleared he found himself in the outhouse behind Uncle Barry's shed. Wally's nose wrinkled at the smell and he stepped out to wait for Dick, whose shining head of black hair emerged moments later along with a small noise of disgust.

"Why did Barry decide he wanted his zeta beam inside an outhouse?"

Wally held his hands up and shook his head. "Don't ask, dude. I'm serious."

Dick muttered, "I'm going to ask..." under his breath but Wally pretended not to hear and lead the way around the side of the house to the front door.

When they got inside, the silence of an empty home settled around them. Dick flipped on the lights next to the front door and Wally moved across the living room to the kitchen counter where a small, hastily scribbled note had been left. It read: _Wally, I heard._ This vague statement was followed by several winking smiley faces and a poorly drawn thumbs up. _Have fun tonight, be safe, and congratulations! Iris and I will be home late. - Uncle B, p.s. We are so proud of you!_

"Oh God..." Wally set the note down on the counter and pushed it to the farthest edge. "Be safe? What does that mean...?" he whispered.

Across the room, Dick's head popped up from behind the open doors of the entertainment system. "Everything okay?" he asked.

Wally met his gaze with a grim expression and said, "Do you think Bats would tell Uncle B about us fake-dating?"

Dick took a moment to consider. "Maybe," he said, and then ducked down behind the doors again.

"Maybe?" Wally wheezed, and didn't realize he had used his super speed until he found himself looming over Dick who was crouched in front of his ps3 with an open case of Portal 2 in one hand and a controller in the other.

"I mean, yeah. It's not unlikely. Remember when Roy got his first girlfriend? Ollie told _everybody_." Wally watched his ps3 slurp up the disk between Dick's slim fingers and he felt a rock begin to form in the pit of his stomach.

"Dude, Bruce isn't Ollie, though, and you're not my first - um... relationship."

"Nice save," Dick said and stood, tossing a controller at Wally. "My point is that Bruce probably called Barry after you talked to him to square things away, but I doubt he blabbed about it to the whole league."

Wally reached for Dick's shoulder as he moved to sit on the couch and held him back, "Dude you don't know. Uncle B's not going to leave me alone about this for a single minute, okay? He's going to want _explicit details_!"

Dick pulled his shoulder out of Wally's grip and shot him an unimpressed look. "If you can handle Bruce, I think you can handle your own uncle, Wally."

Wally forced a quiver into his lip and followed Dick to the couch, his controller hanging limply from his fingertips. "You're the worst boyfriend I've never had."

"Quit being a baby and play this co-op with me."

"Fine," Wally said, falling onto the couch beside Dick. "But you have to help me deal with him when he comes home..."

+o+o+o+

By the time Aunt Iris and Uncle Barry returned from what Wally could only assume was a hot date, Wally had forced Dick into the Allen's spare bedroom in anticipation of their arrival. Wally didn't know why Uncle B didn't just _give_ him the bedroom, because it wasn't like anybody but he and Dick ever used it anyway. It was a lot harder to explain to Wally's parents why Richard Grayson, ward of Gothamite billionaire Bruce Wayne, was spending the night at their house than it was to tell Barry Dick was coming over and leave it at that.

Dick hadn't exactly been keen on dropping their co-op at nine pm sharp to go into "Wally's" room and watch Disney movies on his old crappy laptop, but Wally figured if they were in the room ahead of time and changed into their pajamas (or in Dick's case, changed into one of Wally's old sweaters and a pair of flannel pants that he'd left there during their last sleepover), the chances of Barry cornering him were minimal, especially if he could get Dick to fake sleep with him under the covers.

When Wally heard the tell tail click of the front door being unlocked and the groan of its wood swinging open followed by keys tinkling, he slammed the laptop shut on John Smith's chiseled face and pushed Dick back against the pillows. If he had had more time, Wally would have stopped panicking to appreciate the strangled, high pitched gasp that Dick made as he fell back against the mattress, but Wally was too busy shoving his laptop underneath the bed crawling between the sheets to pay it any attention.

"Dude-!"

"Shhhh!" Wally whispered so hard, he may have inadvertently spit in Dick's face, and this possibility showed in the frown crossing Dick's lips, but Dick remained quiet and settled against the pillows sporting a pout and crossed arms.

Through the thin walls, Wally could hear his aunt and uncle exchanging playful banter, and he swore he heard his name mentioned once or twice and maybe even Dick's, too. The moment of truth came as they finally sauntered down the hallway, their echoes growing louder when they neared the door to the spare bedroom.

"Do you think they're asleep?" That was Uncle Barry's voice. Next to Wally, Dick huffed.

"Leave them alone, Barry they've probably had a long day."

"Yeah, but-"

"_Barry_." Wally thanked the lord for small favors when he heard Uncle Barry's defeated sigh and the slow trudge of footsteps down the hall.

"You're aunt rocks," Dick whispered.

"Tell me about it," Wally leaned over the edge of the bed and dragged his laptop back onto the mattress. When he turned back to Dick, the sweater that Wally had lent him was being peeled away to reveal a thin, long sleeved yellow shirt that Wally had not told Dick he could wear. "Dude!"

"What?" Dick looked back at him innocently as he tossed the sweater on the floor. "You're like a furnace. I'm not going to sleep next to you wearing heavy wool."

"That's my shirt!"

"So?" Dick looked perturbed and Wally just stared at him. Eventually, Dick let out a voiceless yawn and stretched against the pillows.

"You know what. Whatever, I don't care." Wally said.

Dick's chest shuddered with silent laughter underneath the loose fitting shirt and Wally frowned because for some reason he couldn't muster the conviction to ignore Dick.

"Du-ude," Dick said and Wally finally reached for his laptop. "_Dude_." It was hard not to notice the elbow nudging him in the shoulder, though.

"What?" Wally pushed himself up on the pillows so that he was leaning against the back board of his bed next to Dick.

"We've got to seal the deal." Dick yawned again and Wally knew it would only be a matter of time now before he passed out. He already wasn't making any sense and his eyes were half lidded in the dim light of the computer.

"What are you even talking about dude?" John Smith stared up at Wally when he looked back at the screen. He turned the volume down and pressed play, but didn't really pay any attention when Dick started talking again.

"I'm saying we should kiss in front of Artemis the next time we're at the cave."

Wally stared at Dick for a moment, but the only expression to be seen was that tired faced, shit eating smirk and a pair of raised eyebrows. "Are you serious?" Wally asked. "Is this ever going to stop?"

"It'll stop after it's been going on long enough for us to stage a believable breakup." Dick said.

Wally groaned. "What constitutes a believable break for you, though? I'm not going to fake a screaming match in the middle of the cave's lounge..."

Dick sent him a withering look and said, "What part of that would be believable? We'll just tell them that a romantic relationship was too difficult to figure out with our history, and we decided to just be best friends."

A long sigh left Wally's lips and he said, "Okay fine..." He was about to go back to watching Pocahontas but a thought stopped him before he could and he turned back to Dick. "Have you ever even actually kissed anyone, dude?"

Dick sent him a displeased expression. "Um, yeah, I have."

Wally returned the look and said, "Really? Because as long as I've known you, which is a pretty long time, you have not mentioned having any girlfriends to me, and we are best buds. I'm not saying I would be mad, but I mean, if you've been keeping secret girlfriends from me I would be mad, okay?"

Dick rolled his eyes and even if Wally hadn't seen it, he would have been able to _feel _it. "You don't have to have a girlfriend to have been kissed, dude. _You_ should know that."

Wally frowned. "I'm going to pretend you didn't say that. But seriously, when have you been kissed? Because, I mean, we're not girls, but that is still something you tell your best bro about, okay?"

Dick shrugged. "It wasn't that great, honestly."

When Wally saw Dick's hand move in his peripheral vision to push the bangs out of his face, he decided that this was an issue that required his full attention. He shut the laptop, leaving only a small, blue plug-in bulb by the door to light the room. "Alright, spill. What happened?"

Dick's turned to look at him, and even though the darkness kept Wally from discerning his expression, he could sense the skepticism miles away. "Are you kidding me?

"No? Dude, I'm serious, come on. Bros don't keep secrets from Bros."

Dick groaned and his head hit the backboard with a _thunk_ and then lolled a bit. "It's not a secret, Wally. It's just a shitty thing that happened."

Wally trained his eyes on Dick's form. One arm was wound across his chest and the other propped against it so he could pinch the bridge of his nose. With a gentle nudge, Wally kept his voice light and said, "That's fine dude. If you don't want to tell me it's ok. I'm not going to make you, you know."

Wally felt Dick's eyes on him. "I _just_ said it wasn't a secret."

"...So-"

"She just... died."

Wally swallowed. This revelation was progressing a little bit faster than he had anticipated. It had taken _months_ for Dick to tell him about his parents, even after he told Wally about his ID. "W-who died?"

Dick groaned and said, "Are you even paying attention? My first kiss. I was like, eleven, and I had just gotten her out of this old museum that was about to blow up and she told me I was her hero and kissed me. It was really cheesy. I left her like a block away from the museum and went to go after Batman because the guy who had planted the bomb was getting away, but the explosion ruptured a gas line and she was caught in the fallout and she died." Dick remained completely still until he had finished talking, at which point he uncrossed his arms and tucked his legs beneath him under the covers.

"Dick..." Wally put a tentative hand on Dick's shoulder and when he didn't flinch or duck away like he did when he was _really_ upset, Wally moved his hand across Dick's back and pulled him just a little bit closer. "Dude, I'm really sorry. That... that shouldn't have happened to you."

Dick huffed. "It shouldn't have happened to _her_. I should have taken her farther from the museum. I only dropped her off a _block_ away. I should have _known_ better."

"You were eleven, dude..." Wally gave his shoulders a squeeze.

"Yeah, but I'd been wearing the cape for _two_ years. I knew better than to just leave her there."

Wally sighed. "Dick, you were _eleven,_ okay?"

After a moment of silence, Dick made a displeased noise and crossed his arms, but Wally felt him relax into the arm around his shoulders and that was probably as good of a resignation as Wally was going to get.

"You have got to stop letting stuff eat you up like this, dude..."

Dick's shoulders lifted into a shrug beneath Wally's arm and he said, "Can I tell you something stupid?"

"You've never had to ask before," Wally chuckled. He got a sharp elbow to the side for that and Dick slipped away from him and tugged the covers up to his neck with a huff. Wally wheezed out a few more laughs, then said, "Aw, come on dude, I was kidding!" There was no response so Wally took to whining Dick's name as long and loudly as he could without alerting Uncle Barry to their wakeful state. Eventually Dick's hand came out and smacked him blindly in the side of the head.

"Fine! _Fine._" Dick sat up slightly and ran a hand through his hair. "After she died - the girl who kissed me - I kept wishing - I mean, besides that she hadn't died - that she hadn't kissed me."

"How come?" Wally asked, settling back against the pillows.

"Because... I don't know. It would have been just as bad, even if she hadn't kissed me, but I guess, my mom always used to make such a big deal about how her first kiss was Dad, so I just sort of always thought that mine wouldn't be... you know... a horrible tragedy."

"Hey," Wally grabbed Dick's hand and pulled it away from his face, clasping it tightly. "You got to give that girl a kiss from her favorite hero before she died, dude. That has to count for something, right? Plus, you always got me, and I am anything but a horrible tragedy. Boyfriend extraordinaire, remember?"

Dick snorted and his hand tightened around Wally's reflexively. "Yeah, right. _I_ was the boyfriend extraordinaire. You're more like a never ending train wreck."

Wally slammed their conjoined hands down onto the nest of blankets between them. "Not cool! I'm trying to be sentimental, here dude!"

A tinkle of laughter escaped Dick's mouth and it was nice not to hear the formulaic cackle that he usually used. "I know. Thanks, Wally." He squeezed Wally's hand again and Wally squeezed back just before Dick let go and slipped beneath the covers, trying to mask a yawn.

Wally followed suit and rolled onto his side. "Hey, that's what a best pal's for, right?" He heard Dick mumble something that sounded like agreement from behind him before two hands crept through the sheets and held on loosely to the neck of his shirt, followed by a pair of knees that curled against his back. Dick's breaths mellowed out into even puffs that kept ruffling the hair at the base of Wally's head. At first it just made him shiver, but eventually the warm air only ended up lulling him to sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:** I'm not sure about the pacing of this one? I literally wrote all of the last half of it today so there is a very large possibility that I might be blind to some of it's larger mistakes. Also I'm kiiiinda worried about the characterization but ugh its too soon to tell whatever here it is.

* * *

Ultimately, it was Wally's stomach that pulled him out of slumber, hallow inside of him and in dire need of food. He woke to smothered sunshine, glowing through the pale blue curtains of his aunt and uncle's guest room. The blankets had been completely stripped from the bed and Wally's arms and feet suffered from the chill of a night spent mostly uncovered. Dick wasn't even on the bed anymore. For a moment Wally suspected that he might have gotten up early to mingle with Uncle Barry or do some weird morning Bat stretches, but he couldn't hear Dick's tone in the muffled voices of his aunt and uncle chatting in the kitchen down the hall, and the shuffle of paper being flipped along a lengthy sigh alerted Wally to his likely presence in the room.

On the other side of the bed, propped up on his forearms with his back arched in a crescent and his legs dangling above his head, Dick flipped the page of a stray chemistry book and made a bored sounding huff. Wally watched him from the edge of the mattress, lying on his stomach as he peered over it.

"I thought you were in a coma or something." Dick said, and flipped another page. Was he actually even reading it? "This is the worst book I've ever read, by the way. I hope this isn't what Barry reads you before bed, there's like, no plot."

"Dude, that's a chemistry text book." Wally said.

"Yeah I know." Dick flipped another page.

Wally groaned and rolled over on the bed. "Why are you weird?" His stomach rumbled and he groaned again and said, "Hungry."

Dick hummed a laugh and said, "Time to face The Flash."

+o+o+o+

Dick didn't stay very long after that. He told Wally he had to leave because of "urgent bat business" but Wally was pretty sure that Dick left more because breakfast with Barry was "un_barry_able", which was fine with Wally because that pun had been a war crime and after Dick made it, Wally didn't want him to stay any longer.

On his way out, Wally kissed each of Dick's knuckles and told him he was his "bitty birdy prince". Dick's face twitched a dozen times in its efforts to keep from grimacing in front of Barry and Wally had to hold his breath to seal in his laughter.

In retaliation, Dick leaned forward and pecked Wally on the lips (pecked him like a freaking bird, if a bird had a tiny, soft mouth for a beak that was warm and a little bit chapped, instead of hard and sharp), then he ran away cackling. Literally.

Nothing had ever happened so fast, and at the same time lasted for so long in Wally's whole life. He stood in the door way for a moment feeling like he was going to barf and wondering if he had just imagined that happening until Barry came up behind him, slung an arm around his shoulder and said, "I'm so happy for you two." That only made Wally want to barf more.

+o+o+o+

Wally worked hard not to feel weird around Dick after that. Things were quiet, and not a lot was going on that needed the team's attention, just big public eye stuff that only the league was allowed to handle, so Dick and Wally spent most of their free time at Wayne Manor playing video games in the home theater and watching bad sci-fi movies and, occasionally for Dick's sake, rom coms.

Dick seemed completely un-phased, but then Dick would. His normalcy helped more than it hurt, honestly, but sometimes Wally would accidentally watch Dick's lips when he was talking and think about the fact that he could legitimately claim to have kissed those lips, and at that point most coherent thought was lost on him, and following a conversation was just an unrealistic expectation. Sometimes they would bump shoulders on the couch, or Dick would lean on him, and it wasn't as though those things hadn't always happened, but Wally was just so aware of them that it almost made him feel sick again.

For a period of about three weeks Wally had no obligations besides school and patrolling with the Flash. Every few days he would be called in to train with Black Canary, but Dick was rarely there and Wally suspected that had to do with the fact that Batman trained Dick enough for three sessions with Black Canary every day.

Most times he paired up with Artemis because his speed gave her a more challenging moving target than anyone else, and because he "needed practice avoiding projectiles". A good portion of her suction tipped arrows missed, but she hit him in the arm or shoulder at least five times, and once in the side of the head. After everyone had finished laughing at Wally's expense, Black Canary told them to hit the showers, and Conner and Kaldur stepped into the ring.

When Wally came into the lounge toweling his still damp hair, he spotted Dick in his civvies, hunched over the couch, typing on the thinnest laptop he had ever seen. He knew it had to be bat tech because the screen had a holographic projector and Dick would occasionally enter code on it.

Wally tossed his towel on a chair in the kitchen and sped toward the couch, hopping over the back and landing next to Dick. "What's up Rob?" he asked, peering over Dick's shoulder. "You haven't been here in a while."

Dick hummed. "Red Tornado needed me to update the security systems. I'm just stopping by to install the new codes and make sure everything's running smoothly." Dick said.

"Sounds really boring." Wally leaned his arm on top of Dick's shoulder and watched his thin fingers skitter across the keyboard. "Dude you're rock hard." Wally said, and moved his arm to grip Dick's shoulder with his hand.

"Do you always come on to people like that, or am I just allotted special treatment because we're boyfriends?"

Wally was quiet for a moment, the gears in his head franticly whirring while he tried to figure out what Dick had actually meant by that until it finally dawned on him and said, "_DUDE_! I meant your shoulders! Gross!"

Dick just laughed, and Wally exacted revenge by scooting closer and grabbing both of Dick's shoulders, squeezing them and then vibrating his hands. This resulted in Dick's laughter taking on a suddenly higher pitch as he started squirming away.

"_Stop_ stopstop-!" Dick twisted and fell over on the couch. Wally didn't want to think about the consequences of falling on top of him so he released Dick and let him recover while he heaved out a few more breathless laughs. "Dude you don't know how weird it feels when you do that. It's like a massage chair that's _inside_ my back."

Dick sat up again and Wally leaned into the couch. "You liked it last time."

"Yeah, well last time I was also totally high on Alfred's bat strength pain killers."

Wally snickered and muttered, "Bat strength" under his breath. "What have you been doing, though, dude? I mean you're not usually that tight, are you?"

"No, Batman's been giving me some extra lessons to counter all the sessions I've been missing with Black Canary, and they're sort of killing me, to be honest." Dick let out a mirthless laugh. "But, you know. That's pretty much normal."

"Dude-" Wally paused when his stomach growled loudly, and he zipped into the kitchen and pulled a jumbo bag of Doritos out of the cupboard before speeding back to Dick. "Have you talked to him about it? I mean if you're that worn out by them, that's not good - for missions and stuff, too, not just you know, whatever else."

"Well put." Dick said and rolled his eyes. "What should I say to him, Wally?" Dick raised his voice an octave and it sounded weirdly the same as it had when he was ten and Wally had just met him. "Hey Batman, your war on crime is really tiring for a tiny kid like me, so I was thinking maybe I could just be a casual crime fighter, you know, maybe train part time and then pick up hours at Weenie Hut JR's on the weekends."

Wally pulled his hand out of the Dorito bag to point at Dick. "Ok, that attitude right there is going to run you into the ground dude. Trust me. I know a lot about running into the ground."

Dick laughed. "Yeah, I bet."

"_Hey_-!" Dick's hand was suddenly on Wally's _mouth_ and Wally ignored the way his heart picked up speed at the touch and the faint, dusty smell of chalk residue on his palm. He had probably been practicing with Bruce right before this.

"Is that Artemis?" Dick whispered, letting his hand fall from Wally's mouth.

"Huh?"

"Listen!"

Wally did, and he could just faintly make out the chatter of Artemis' tone down the hall, but the words were lost on him. He nodded at Dick. "Yeah, I think so, why?" Before Wally could actually react, the bag of Doritos had been shoved out of his lap and replaced with _Dick_, straddling his legs, with hands on his shoulders.

"We're going to make out, okay?"

The urge to choke on the chip in his mouth was strong, but Wally resisted and swallowed it, hissing, "_What_?"

"Remember what I said before? We were going to do it the next time we saw Art."

"Oh," Wally remembered Dick saying they were going to _kiss_, but that was too blasé for Dick Grayson. Wally should have known that what he had really meant was make out.

"I need your consent, dude." Dick said. "Am I okay to start kissing you?"

Wally wanted to say was that maybe they should just do a peck, like they had in front of Barry, or cuddle or something, because this seemed like a _lot_, but instead he just said, "Ye-ah," and as soon as he did, Dick pressed flush against him, arms around Wally's neck, and mouth brushing against Wally's lips.

Wally had been kissed on several occasions by several girls (and once by Dick) but he'd never had any of them press themselves into him so fiercely that he could feel their heartbeat, and they had never gripped the hair at the base of his neck and tugged to angle his head so they could breathe over his lips before kissing him with disturbing tenderness.

As such, Wally had no idea what to do with his hands. He put them first on Dick's ribs, feeling the way his chest expanded after the kiss broke off. When the voices down the hall grew louder and dangerously close, he let them slip lower, following the gentle curve of Dick's side through the thin fabric of his shirt. That was when Dick laughed and squirmed against him, which did nothing to help Wally concentrate, his mouth filled as it was with the buzzing hum of Dick's snickering.

The volume of Artemis' chatting reached a peak and then stopped suddenly. Wally assumed that she had entered the room and was now taking time to regain her composure because for several long seconds all Wally could hear was the sound of Dick's breathing as he exhaled over Wally's cheek and then kissed the corner of his mouth.

"Are you _kidding_ me?" Wally jumped when Artemis' voice rang through the room. "Other people have to sit on that couch, you guys! This is _so_ disre-" A harsh whisper from someone else cut Artemis off and Wally tried to listen in, but Dick was spreading kisses along his neck and it sent a tickle all the way down his shoulder that was hard to think through.

After that there was just silence and Dick moved to Wally's other side, using Wally's head to obstruct Artemis and her plus one's view so he could whisper, "They're still there..."

Wally had no way of responding without Artemis catching on so he just nudged Dick in the side with his hand and hoped the action would be correctly interpreted.

Dick squirmed out of the way and hissed, "Moan or something, dude." Then he began kissing Wally's neck again.

The best Wally could do under the circumstances was a sort of strained sounding "Uuuhh..." and before he had even finished, Dick buried his face against Wally's shoulder and began to shake with poorly concealed laughter. In the background, Wally heard Artemis and her plus one giggling and the shame was sobering beyond belief. Wally sunk into the couch and Dick sunk with him, still trembling with bursts of mirth. "How about _you_ moan, _dick_," Wally hissed.

"Fine," Dick said, and shifted slightly, kneeing Wally's stomach in the process – probably on purpose, Wally thought. His head was pulled roughly downward, into the crook of Dick's shoulder and as soon as it made contact, Dick expelled a breathy, groan. His voice cracked half way through and Artemis wolf whistled.

"_Dude_," Wally said, because when had his little baby bird learned to moan like _that_, and _where_?

The tail end of Dick's porno moan turned into growl due to its unwanted positive reception, and he said, "Can you go away, Artemis? We're trying to make out."

"Yeah, I know," Wally could hear the smirk on her lips. "Can you stop talking? We're trying to watch."

Someone in the room squeaked and it was definitely not Wally.

Dick groaned again, this time with much less sexual prowess and then dismounted Wally's thighs and sat next to him on the couch, arms crossed. Wally kept his eyes on the coffee table in front of him, too afraid to look back and see who had been witness to this besides Artemis.

There were two separate snorts of dissatisfaction and then, "Come on Artemis. They're just being boring now." Wally spun around, hands on the back of the couch, and caught the retreating figures of Artemis and _Zatana_ as they rounded the corner of the hallway.

"That didn't work _at all_." Wally said, turning to glare at Dick who was pouting next to him.

Dick glanced at Wally's lap. "It didn't?" He looked back up at Wally with one raised eyebrow and a smirk.

"_Dude_!" The Wally shielded his crotch from view with both hands. "It's just puberty! It's a natural reaction!"

Dick rolled his eyes. "Whatever. I didn't count on Artemis bringing Zee with..." He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, then reached for his lap top, administering several key strokes before closing it. When he stood up, his knee brushed Wally's. "I gotta go, dude."

Wally watched Dick slip the computer into a carrying case and then sling it over his shoulder. "Yeah..." Wally didn't even think to ask why Dick had to go. Normally he would, if Dick didn't give an explanation, and when he did, Dick would lower his voice and say something like, "Bat business," or "emergency meeting with the league." And they would laugh and roll their eyes at each other, but this time Wally just said, "See you, Rob."

Dick raised his hand and waved an ILY sign at Wally, and Wally was suddenly unsure of how to interpret it. "Later, _Wall-man_," he said, and then descended the stairs to the hangar.

+o+o+o+

A sick sort of chill whistled its way through the streets and alleys of Gotham, lifting Dick's cape in the wind as he sat perched on the head of a gargoyle several stories above the ground. The night had not gone as well as it could have, mostly due to inability on Dick's part. There had been a shooting in Harlow earlier in the patrol and Dick had failed to run down the suspect. The guy didn't even have a car. The chase was all on foot. There was no reason Dick shouldn't have been able to catch up to him, except for the fact that he was so sore from Batman's training sessions and his legs kept cramping because he'd never gotten a chance to really stretch the muscles he'd been building, but that still wasn't an excuse. To say the least, Bruce had not been pleased about it and immediately re-assigned him to patrol Uptown instead.

It was a mighty blow to his ego, and his sense of guilt. This guy, this _murderer, _had escaped because of _him_.

For the rest of the night, all Dick had been able to think about was how much he wished Wally had been there. If Wally had been there, catching that guy would have been a breeze. Everything with Wally was a breeze, sometimes literally.

Bruce'sdeep voice shook a shiver out of Dick when it came through the comm link, gritty and somewhat irritated, "Robin, report."

Dick took one last moment to survey the street below him before answering. "Some kid tried to rob a gas station on Harrison. He wasn't too happy when I showed up. Apparently he had been counting on a showdown with you, which I honestly don't understand. You'd think a real fan would know that committing a _crime_ is not exactly the best way to go about getting-"

"Robin."

Dick winced at the added gravel in Bruce's tone. This had to be, what, the fourth time he'd heard it tonight? "Uh, right, besides that, everything has been clear from Granton to North Gainsly."

There was a begrudgingly satisfied grunt and then, "What about Byron Avenue?"

"I haven't had a chance to do a thorough inspection, but I didn't see anything major on my last run through." Dick settled himself down on the head of his gargoyle, letting his legs stretch out over the expanse of open street beneath him.

"Why don't you _take_ the chance, then? Report back when you're finished."

Dick let out a long breath then said, "Right, I'm on it."

In seconds, Dick had scrambled his way around the corner of the building and leapt off the edge. A familiar rush of air fluttered through his stomach for a brief moment and it was a feeling that he had come to find comforting at a very young age. He didn't have time to enjoy it for long before his grappling hook embedded itself into the ledge from which he had just jumped, and slowed his fall down to a less deadly speed, landing him safely next to the R-Cycle shaded from view in the alley below.

Byron Avenue technically ran through all of Gotham city, but since Dick was now only responsible for looking after Uptown this evening, the street was cut much shorter. Unfortunately, it also added Crime Alley to his designated watch spots for the night, which increased the chances of him running into a mugger or drug deal by about one-hundred percent. On the bright side, he could probably rule out having to deal with major crime in the area due to the fact that Crime Alley was the first place Batman targeted when he had begun his war on crime. That, coupled with copious donations from Bruce Wayne and the addition of a new football stadium (also almost entirely funded by Bruce Wayne), successfully turned what the Joker had fondly dubbed "frowntown" into Uptown; the closest Gotham City came to a bustling, crime free urban metropolis. Considering this was Gotham, that still wasn't very close, but it was an area of town to be proud of in the daylight at least.

As predicted, Dick ended up intervening in a drug deal and two muggings - one which he suspected would have ended in sexual assault. Then there was the stupid kid with flaming hair and freckles which stood out starkly against his pale skin and sunken eyes. He tried to offer Dick free cocaine in exchange for not reporting him to the police. He looked uncomfortably similar to Dick's best friend, but he lacked Wally's straight nose and dimpled chin.

The encounter only served to remind Dick of how many times he had caught himself thinking about Wally over the course of the night - over the course of the whole _week_, honestly. At one point he had been reading a text on modern marketing techniques for one of his horrible business classes, and ended up losing track of _three_ pages, because he had let his thoughts wander to Wally.

Then there was this boy, who looked so much _like_ Wally, except thin and sickly, and it made Dick afraid, despite the fact that he had no reason to be. Wally's life was more or less going great, but anything could happen. What if something went horribly wrong, like something in this boy's life obviously had, and Wally spiraled into some deep depression or god knows what?

It was preposterous to worry about, and Dick never _had _worried about it before but he couldn't stop himself. The best he could do was push it to the back of his mind and let it itch in the middle of his subconscious like a spider bite that he couldn't quite reach.

Dick ended up tying the Wally look-a-like to a street light on the corner of Farrow -although mercifully not upside down - with his baggies in a neat little pyramid at his feet, and a tiny note resting on the very top. Then he left.

That, Dick decided, was the end of his patrol for the night. He drove back down the length of Byron, scanning the street halfheartedly for anything criminal in nature and, when he reached Billing Avenue, he pulled to a stop and radioed Batman.

"Report," the tone was just as gruff as before but Dick ignored it.

"Two muggings and some kid who tried to sell me cocaine after I caught him shooting up, but that was it. I left him with a note for Gordon, I think he was homeless, so-"

"Head back to the Cave. I'll meet you there later, there's something else I need to take care of first."

"Do you need any help?" Dick leaned on the dashboard of his bike and watched the streetlights ahead of him change from red to green.

"No. You've done enough for tonight." Normally that statement would have carried a satisfied, one could almost say prideful tone to it, but this night, Dick sensed a distinctly mocking edge.

"What's that supposed to-"

"Batman _out_." The airy buzz of their connection was cut and Robin wanted very badly to hit something _very_ hard, but he honestly didn't have the energy so instead he ripped the comm link out of his ear, stuffed it into his utility belt, and made sure to blow every red light on his way back to the Cave.

+o+o+o+

As usual, Alfred was waiting for him when he drove onto the hydraulic turntable, somewhat unintentionally screeching to a stop. He hadn't meant to leave skid marks but the smell of burnt rubber trailed behind him and Alfred descended the second set of stairs, eyeing the dark marks with a disdainful expression.

"Rough night, Master Dick?"

Dick swung off the bike and just barely resisted the urge to throw his helmet on the ground when he took it off. "It was fine," he said.

Alfred walked towards the line of rubber that had been burned into the floor of the cave and peered down at it. "I'm sure."

"Uh," half way up the stairs, Dick turned around and said, "Sorry about that, Alf..."

Alfred straightened and smiled at Dick. "Oh, don't apologize on my account. After all, you are the one who'll be scrubbing it clean come tomorrow morning."

Dick's face fell, his helmet dangling from the tips of his barely curled fingers. "But-I have school tomorrow!"

"Isn't it the early bird that catches the worm, Robin? I'm sure you'll be able to make time for it before you leave."

"That's not- ... okay, it's fair, but can't it wait until after school?" Dick asked, letting his lip jut out just a bit and slouching on the steps. Pouting didn't go over very well with Bruce most of the time, but sometimes he could get Alfred to cave if he managed to look pathetic enough.

Alfred hummed and donned an expression of deep thought that Dick suspected might have been faked. "Perhaps I could be convinced to allow you to put it off if you could be convinced to speak to me about whatever dilemma it is that you're experiencing this night?"

Dick sighed and shifted his weight to one foot. "Yeah... alright." He said, glancing away from Alfred's approaching form.

A thin but strong hand patted him on the shoulder and Alfred smiled. "Very good, sir. Why don't you clean yourself up and I'll prepare some tea and biscuits. I even managed to purchase some of that strawberry rhubarb jam you're so fond of."

Dick let a small smile slip across his mouth and mumbled, "Thanks, Alfred," before heading off to the showers.

+o+o+o+

When the dining room proved to be dark and thoroughly empty, with only the light of the moon shining in barred strips through the windows and across the table, Dick expanded his search to the living room and found Alfred waiting for him on the green floral patterned couch, already sipping at his tea with a plate of shortbread cookies and scones laid out on the coffee table.

Dick hadn't bothered to change into anything besides his pajamas; an oversized shirt that may or may not have been Wally's - he tried not to think about that - and a pair of personalized Wayne Enterprises silk pajama pants that Bruce had gotten for him last Christmas. They were an extremely ugly shade of brown that Dick felt resembled diarrhea, but they were very comfortable. Still, Dick couldn't help wondering if it would have been too much to ask for a nicer color.

Alfred patted the cushion next to him and said, "What seems to be the matter, Master Dick?"

Dick fell onto the couch with a huff. "It's really stupid, Alf."

"We'll see about that. Master Bruce mentioned something along the lines of an escaped murderer?"

Dick had been about to reach for a scone when Alfred's words stopped him with his hand outstretched and he sunk into the couch. "I-yeah..."

"May I ask what happened?" Alfed leaned forward and slathered a scone with jam, then handed it to Dick.

He took it gingerly, holding it by the tips of his fingers to keep them from becoming sticky. "I just... my leg cramped up." Dick leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "I was chasing the guy one second, and the next I was literally falling on my face..." He groaned and hung his head.

Alfred's hand came to rest on his back but Dick didn't bother looking up. He knew Alfred's expressions of condolence well enough by now to imagine them in his head. "That doesn't sound very stupid to me at all. Unfortunate and poorly timed, perhaps, but certainly not something that you had any amount of control over." Alfred took a deep breath and then reached for his tea. "It seems unusual though. You've never experienced difficulty with cramping before, have you?"

Dick hunched his shoulders in a prolonged shrug and shook his head. "Not really, I mean not unless I didn't stretch right, or well enough after or before training. I just... I think it's Bruce's new regime? I'm still getting used to it, I guess. It's just," A long sigh escaped him and he sat back against the couch, crossing his legs over the large cushions. "He basically kicked me into Uptown tonight, which, okay, yeah, Uptown needs to be patrolled too, but that's like the area I patrolled when I was just starting out. And when I asked him if he needed help after I did my rounds he just told me to go home because I had 'done enough already'. What does that even mean? I understand that he's upset, I messed up, I get it, but how can he expect me to operate at one-hundred percent when he keeps wearing me down in every single training session?" Dick expelled a loud groan bolted upright, still cradling his scone carefully between his fingers. "I haven't had time to do _anything_ besides training, homework or missions since it started! I've only seen Wally like _once_ in the past _four weeks_!" Dick cut himself off and took a large bite of scone before he could say anything else. He just _had_ to bring Wally into this.

Alfred stayed silent for a moment, watching Dick breath heavily through his nose while he chewed. "Perhaps you should inform Master Bruce about this," he finally said. "You can't expect him to be aware of your physical limitations on his own. It's up to you to let him know that you're struggling."

Dick huffed through his mouthful of dry scone and locked eyes with the fire blazing across the room.

Alfred cleared his throat. "Speaking of Master Wally, I seem to have overheard something along the lines of your being in romantic relations with him? How is that coming along?"

Dick swallowed and tried not to frown. He had made his bed; he might as well lie in it. "It's... not really."

Next to him, Alfred shifted. "Are you two fighting?"

"No... We're not-" Dick made a frustrated noise and then turned on the couch to face Alfred fully. "_Alfred_,"

"Oh my," Alfred set down his tea and angled himself towards Dick. "This is serious, do go on."

"You can't tell Bruce, no matter _what_."

Alfred raised his right hand the corner of his lips raised with it. "Not a word, Master Dick."

Dick nodded and held his breath briefly, then blurted out, "We're not actually dating."

Alfred's smile fell with his hand. "Aren't you?"

"No." Dick said. "It was supposed to be a prank on the team, but then Bruce found out and - remember Nic Cage?"

Alfred's smirk returned. "How could I forget dear old Nicolas?"

"It would be so much worse than that if Bruce found out I was fake-dating Wally."

"The fallout would be dreadful, I agree." Alfred nodded. "What do you propose to do?"

"The-" Dick broke eye contact with Alfred and stared at his lap, twirling his scone between his fingers. "Well, the thing is, Alf... I-" he took a deep breath and looked back at Alfred. "Okay, so we sort of kissed, f-for the prank, right?"

Alfred raised an eyebrow and nodded.

"And it wasn't even really a kiss. I mean we did it for Artemis - n-not _for_ Artemis!" Dick exclaimed holding his hand out as though Alfred were about to burst into flaming rage at the mere notion of Dick involved in voyeurism. "B-but to freak her out, um..." his hand lowered, and he took a moment to remember how he was even going to say this. "Anyway, now I sort of keep thinking about it and just, Wally in general like, _all _the time, and it's so stupid because I don't know if I actually like him that way a-all of a sudden, or if it's just because, I mean, we're _best_ friends and we haven't really been seeing each other a lot lately or - I don't know b-but what really freaks me out is; what if I do like him and he doesn't feel that way back? Or what if I think I do, and I'm wrong and I do something stupid and ruin our whole friendship over it?" Dick had to take a deep breath at the end of his speech. He wondered vaguely if this was how Wally felt whenever he talked super-speed with Barry.

"Oh dear," Alfred's easy smile had morphed into a much more serious, thin line, but there was kindness in his eyes when he reached for Dick's hand - the one that wasn't sticky with jam despite Dick's best efforts to keep his fingers away from the rhubarb jelly. "Now Master Dick, you listen here."

Alfred's fingers were thin and boney between Dick's, and just a little bit cold, but he squeezed them and nodded.

"Wallace Rudolph West cares very, very deeply for you, as I'm sure you already know. Now, whether or not his care is romantically inclined, I would never presume to say, but he is not the sort of friend to simply dismiss your feelings because they may or may not make him uncomfortable. Do you understand?"

"Yeah," Dick said and sighed through his nose. "But-"

"There are no buts about it."

Dick wrinkled his nose and held back what would have been a weak laugh. "Don't say that, Alf."

"I will not let the likes of you tell me when I may or may not use the term buts, Master Richard. You _know_ was not referencing anyone's rear end."

This time Dick did laugh and he swore he saw Alfred roll his eyes.

"Forgetting your _brief _affair with immaturity, if it is indeed possible to forget, what you must do is tell Dear Wally everything that you have told me tonight about your feelings for him. If you are completely honest, there is no way that he can interpret them as anything other than what they are."

Dick grimaced. "Why did I know that's what you were going to say?"

Alfred leaned in close and said, "Because you're a very smart young man who is very good at not doing the very things he knows he must."

"Was that a compliment or an insult?" Dick asked.

Alfred simply smiled at him and patted his hand. "Why don't you finish that scone you've been nursing and then get to bed before Master Bruce returns home and forces you into a heart-to-heart with him tonight as well."

"Yeah..." Dick scooted slowly off the couch. "Um, can I take the scone to my room?"

Alfred's eyes narrowed and he looked to be in deep thought, another ruse, Dick suspected. "I suppose you may, on this one occasion. But mark my word Richard Grayson, if you get rhubarb jam on your bed sheets..."

Dick laughed. "I won't Alf, I promise." He meandered around the couch at a leisurely pace, the soreness from patrol was already starting to kick in and Dick didn't want to think about how he'd feel tomorrow morning. When he reached the door to the living room he stopped and said, "You know you're the best, right Alf?"

"I'm well aware, yes." Alfred smiled at him over the back of the couch and then shooed him off with a little wave.

+o+o+o+

It was almost four in the morning by the time Dick made it up to his room. For lack of tiredness, he decided to sit in his squeaky leather desk chair in the dark and eat the scone that had, at this point, lost most of its jelly to Dick's fingers, which he kept licking to keep from getting sticky. Every few seconds he would push off from the desk and spin a bit to keep things interesting, trying his damnedest not to notice the green dot flashing every ten or so seconds on his phone.

Dick swore he never gave his hand explicit permission to pick up the phone after he'd finished his scone, and he definitely hadn't told it that it could open up his message center and find a new voice mail accompanied by a missed call from Wally. At that point, Dick didn't even bother trying to stop himself. He had typed in his password and was listening to the message before he even realized what he had done.

It wasn't anything special, just Wally complaining that they hadn't done anything recently and asking if Dick had talked to Bruce about his "madly intense" training, but Wally's voice put an itch in the back of Dick's throat that he had thought had faded after his talk with Alfred. He didn't want to just _listen_ to Wally's voice. He wanted to talk to Wally himself. He wanted to tell Wally that they should break up and laugh about all of the different ways they could go about doing it. He wanted things to stop feeling weird and start feeling normal. He wanted to tell Wally about the guy who he'd let get away today, and he wanted to hear Wally tell him what he already knew; that it wasn't his fault and that he had tried his best. He wanted that so badly it scared him but what scared him even more was the gurgled mumble that sounded vaguely like his own name which had just come out of his phone's speaker.

Dick glanced at the screen in horror and came face to face with a picture of Wally stuffing his stupid mouth at his favorite pizza place in Central and the words _Active Call_ underneath him. When had Dick called Wally? Dick _hadn't_ called Wally. There was no way, that in the midst of his musing _about_ Wally, he had actually managed to _call _Wally without even realizing it, even if there _was_ a much too conveniently placed call back button right next to Wally's missed call notification.

"W-Wally?" Dick asked because maybe he was just hallucinating this. He _had_ been up for almost twenty-two hours, it wasn't impossible.

"M'yeah, dude. That's my name. Gold Star." Wally's voice was low and gritty with sleep and Dick could almost perfectly imagine him, hanging over the edge of his bed after having fished his phone out of the pants pocket of a pair of jeans he'd left on the floor earlier that day.

"Uh... sorry, I woke you up, huh?" Dick bent over, resting his chin on the edge of the desk and peering at Wally's freckled face on his phone.

Wally laughed quietly. "Noooo, dude it's not like it's three in the morning or something, why would you think that, Dick?"

Dick winced and his head lolled to the side, squishing his cheek against the desk. "Sorry... you can go back to sleep, I didn't really have anything to say anyway-"

"_Wow_!" Wally's voice was loud and Dick fumbled to pick up his phone and lower the volume of its speakers incase Bruce was anywhere nearby. "I might be mad if you called me at three in the morning for absolutely _no reason_, but if you actually had something you wanted to talk about, I would probably be okay with it, is that weird or what."

Dick let out a gust of air. "Okay..." He sat up in the chair and pushed off from the desk with his feet until he hit the bed. "Um."

"Wow, spill dude."

Telling Wally about the shooter was a heavier conversation than Dick wanted to have at that moment, so instead he said, "I was thinking that maybe we should fake break up."

There was a disturbing silence on the other line and Dick didn't know if it was a product of his own imagination or if Wally was actually taking a moment to pause. Eventually he heard the rustling of what Dick presumed to be bed sheets. "For real?"

"Yeah... I don't know. Yeah."

Wally's breath came in as static over the phone. "I was that bad a kisser, huh?"

A string of gross and nervous giggles escaped Dick and it was too many seconds before he managed to stop them and say, "Well you did eat like half a bag of Doritos right before we made out. That didn't exactly help."

"Oh," Wally said, and the mock hurt in his tone made Dick's lips curl upwards. "I see how it is. You're going to dump me because of my serious metabolism. That's pretty low."

"No." Dick crawled over the back of his chair and onto his bed. "I mean, I maybe talked to Alfred about it, and he maybe said we should stop..."

Wally laughed. "Okay goodie-two-shoes, whatever you say." There was a short silence and then Wally said, "_Wait_, he's not going to tell Bats is he?" The quivering panic in Wally's tone was laughable, but Dick restrained himself.

"No," he set his phone on the bed next to him and laid down on his side, curling around it and tucking his arms into his chest. "I made him promise not to."

"Good," Wally said, "Because I don't feel like being killed by the fiery wrath of justice, ever."

"Mmhmm," Dick said. Wally's face on his phone was starting to blur and he blinked to refocus his eyes.

"So did you literally call just to tell me this?" Wally asked.

Dick yawned. "I told you it wasn't that important..."

"So you _really_ just called so you could talk to me." Dick could hear the humor in Wally's tone but the truth of his statement was so distressing that the snarky reply Dick had originally planned on giving got stuck in his throat. When he didn't answer Wally just laughed and said, "Aww."

"No I didn't," Dick said and Wally laughed louder. Dick groaned and buried his head in his pillow. He was officially too tired to dish out appropriate comebacks, even though he could understand Wally's words perfectly fine.

"This is so rude, you literally woke me up and now you're falling asleep on me." Wally's tone suggested that he was much less offended by this than he was endlessly amused by it.

"No m'not." Dick said and blinked hard to keep his vision from clouding with sleep.

"Hey, listen," Wally said and Dick blinked again and wiggled against his bed sheets in an attempt to wake himself. "I was at my cousins house over the summer and they have this cockatiel and when it falls asleep it blinks its dumb little eyelids over and over again and then it just squints for a while, and then it keeps blinking, and then eventually it just closes them and is asleep and I kept laughing at it because that is exactly what you do, dude."

Dick blinked and then growled, but he had a feeling it didn't sound very threatening. "No s'not." he said and growled again when Wally laughed.

"You're doing it right now aren't you? You're doing the blinking thing."

"No m'not."

Wally's laughter took an obscene turn for the worst and Dick sighed.

"M'gonna hang up on you." Dick said

At that Wally quieted. "Sorry Sleepy Bird, I have to get you when I can. You're too sharp when you're awake."

Dick grunted to express his dislike of such poor sportsmanship.

"I'm going to go 'kay, dude? It's time for my midnight snack anyway."

"M'kay..." He tried not to let disappointment slip into his tone but Dick wasn't sure he'd successfully withheld it.

"Call me tomorrow alright? But like, at a normal hour."

"M'kay."

Wally laughed one last time and sang off-key, "Goodnight, Dick!"

Dick meant to sing it back to him but instead he just yawned, "G'dniiiigh Waaawwy..." This was met with more uproarious laughter and eventually the click of a cut call. Dick didn't even bother crawling under his sheets to go to sleep, he was already practically dreaming by the time Wally had hung up.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N****:** HAHAHA I AM SORRY THIS TOOK BASICALLY 2 MONTHS TO GET OUT I could hand out a list of reasons but most of them are not really adequate so we'll just leave it at SORRY. IM SORRY. I WILL DO BETTER I PROMISE.

Also, I would like to add a disclaimer for the action/fight scene because I have never been known to write one successfully. Also, for the crazy amount of creative liberty I took regarding Lex Luthor and his Corp. My most sincere apologies to Lex Luthor. I really don't know much about your Corp.

* * *

If Dick listened closely he could hear the faint roar of the batmobile several floors below, humming through the walls of Wayne Manor. To say that he had been upset when Bruce banned him from patrol for the next two nights would be an egregious understatement. Dick had been livid, but after he had thoroughly burned his rage out on the new equipment in the gymnasium, he hadn't felt much of anything except sore and tired. It wasn't too late to do homework, but he'd spent most of the day scrubbing tire tracks off the floor of the batcave and the rest of the day training and quite frankly, homework wasn't on his to-do list right now.

After about fifteen solid minutes of cajoling, Dick managed to convince Alfred to let him take dinner in his room and while doing so, sent Wally a text informing him that right now was his one and only opportunity to answer the video call Dick had just sent him so that they could orchestrate their break up. It actually took Wally almost half an hour to respond to Dick's text, and then another twenty minutes to wrap up his patrol with the Flash. By the time Wally's cheery face popped up on Dick's computer screen, slightly flushed with damp hair from what had to have been a super-speed shower, Dick had long since finished his dinner.

Wally had a bag of chicken whizzies in his hand - and four more empty bags on the desk, Dick was sure - and was wearing one of his lazier lop-sided smiles. "So you've got a plan for this break up thing, right?" Wally asked, tossing a handful of whizzies into his mouth. "Because I know you said you didn't want to do a screaming match, but I think that would be kind of fun, to be honest-"

"I'm not opposed to it, actually." Dick said.

Wally narrowed his eyes and leaned forward. His freckles came into stark focus against the light of his computer screen. "You better not be leading me on, Dick. I don't want to even talk about it if it's not a serious possibility."

A smile curved into the corner of Dick's lips. "What, staging a fight in the middle of Mt. Justice?"

Wally nodded slowly.

"Ok, well say we did that. We still need a reason to be breaking up - but a reason that wouldn't affect our friendship in the long term."

"What if I cheated on you?" Wally asked. Another handful of whizzies was tossed into his mouth.

"Dude, no!" Dick frowned and swallowed against something thick and bitter in the back of his throat. Crossing his arms, he sat back in his desk chair and said, "You'd never actually cheat on me, no one would believe it."

Wally seemed to consider this for a moment and then shrugged. "What if you cheated on me?"

"Neither of us is cheating on each other!"

"Whoa, okay dude, I'm just trying to help." Wally held up his hands. They were dusted with the dry seasoning of his whizzies and Dick was glad that Wally wasn't physically nearby because Dick sort of, really wanted to lick them. It would be disgusting in practice, he was sure, but in theory, the idea was uncomfortably appealing.

Dick groaned. "What if you're not great in bed or something?"

Wally made an enraged noise around a mouthful of whizzies and if his comically slanted eyebrows were anything to go by, he wasn't pleased with this idea. When he swallowed, he said, "No! Excuse you, _Dick_, I am _great_ in bed. You should be so lucky as to have me in bed!"

"Wow, okay, then."

"Besides, that would make you look really petty." Wally said, shrinking back into his seat.

"Well what else do you suggest, _Wallman_?"

Wally hummed and crumpled the bag between his hands. "Maybe I'm mad at you because you're always too busy with batstuff to get busy with me. I mean that's almost true."

"You're not actually mad about that are you? Because we've seriously talked about this so man-"

"Dude no. I'm not," Wally said. He paused to toss his crumpled garbage away and then leaned forward. "I'm just saying, if we were dating, I'd probably want to bone you like all the time. Not that I _do_! But, you know, hypothetically. I'd be upset. Probably."

"I know the situation, Wally. You don't have to tell me this is hypothetical."

The nervous laughter that tinkled through Dick's speakers brought him a sick sort of satisfaction. "Yeah..." Wally said.

"But that could work, actually." Dick grabbed a pen and notebook from the organizer shelves on the side of his desk and began to jot down notes. "You are pretty needy. The idea that you'd want to breakup because I didn't have time to coddle you is probably plausible enough to convince the team."

Wally huffed. "Maybe you could rephrase that I don't think it was insulting enough."

"We'll need to write out a script." Dick said. He paused in his scribbling to glance up at the computer. "You better not forget any of your lines."

Wally muttered under his breath and Dick caught him rolling his eyes before he went back to writing.

The rest of the night was spent discussing their angry banter and exchanging potential insults. Some of Dick's more creative remarks left Wally on the verge of tears either from laughter or rage. By the time Wally told him that he was hanging up because some people (specifically himself) went to bed at normal hours of the night, Dick's whole face hurt from smiling.

+o+o+o+

They had planned very carefully the date on which their breakup would be staged; one and a half weeks after their decision to go through with it, when all members of the team were supposed to be gathering at Mt. Justice for a bi-monthly "team bonding day". The extra time allowed Dick and Wally to memorize their lines and practice in private. Unfortunately, all but one of their practices had ended in fits of laughter. Admittedly, this occurred most often because Wally threw the script, or made a face. Each time he got a stern look from Dick after they had recovered, and sometimes a lecture to boot.

When the day finally arrived, Wally showed up almost an hour early. He told himself it was because he couldn't wait to finally end this stupid boyfriend charade, but he had a feeling he was mostly just nervous. The lounge was empty when he came upstairs, and Wally was pretty sure that there wasn't anyone in the mountain except for Superboy and Miss Martian, both of whom were probably getting down on each other somewhere private - or not so private, if some of the rumors he had heard were true.

It took a lot of Wally's willpower to force himself to sit down in one of the lounge's chairs and _not move_. His legs were practically screaming to do laps around the mountain, but Wally was afraid that if he let himself run anywhere, he might not come back. Dick would be so pissed. His right knee kept bouncing and whatever was on the TV just looked like a big blurry smear in front of Wally's unfocused eyes. It could have been static for all the attention he was paying to it. Wally thought briefly that maybe that was why Conner liked the "no signal" station so much - it was perfect for zoning out.

A distant hum brought Wally half-way out of his stupor and the faint female voice of the zeta beam roused him enough to turn his head and watch the stairs while footsteps drummed up the metal steps. Dick appeared at the top in a black t-shirt and unabashedly red pants. He smiled and said, "Hey, KF," but Wally thought it seemed forced.

"Hey, Rob." And if Dick's greeting seemed forced, Wally's probably sounded like a rock being cranked through a meat grinder.

The look in Dick's eyes felt oddly foreign and familiar at the same time. One corner of his mouth slipped out of its smile as he walked across the lounge. He shoved Wally into the armrest of his chair and squirmed into the small space next to him.

"Ow." Wally shoved Dick back but Dick only deflected the attack, lifting Wally's arm and ducking beneath it so it rested behind his shoulders. "Oh, smooth."

"Enjoy it while it lasts," Dick said and Wally's arm tightened without his consent.

Dick was stiff beneath him and when he moved his hand to dig his thumb gently into the muscle at the base of Dick's neck, Dick yelped and glared at him.

"Dude, don't."

For a moment, Wally watched him, trying to read the entirety of the expression that lay hidden behind those stupid sunglasses of his. "You haven't talked to Bats yet, have you?" Wally struggled to keep his voice down, leaning forward and hovering over Dick.

"No-, well sort of."

"What does that mean?"

Dick sighed and pushed Wally back into the chair. "It just means, I don't know, I messed up a mission a little while ago and he gave me some time off. I thought that would do the trick but it... hasn't. I just need to find the right time to talk him."

"Rob, the right time is now." Wally quieted and squeezed Dick's shoulders. "You can't be going on missions and stuff like this, dude."

Dick's head lolled backwards against Wally's arm and a groan pushed itself out of his mouth. "I know, I _know_... I'll talk to him as soon as I can."

"_Tonight_," Wally said. The word rumbled in the back of his throat.

"Fine," Dick turned his head and his nose brushed Wally's neck. "Tonight."

If the clock on the TV's entertainment station was right, which it always was, they still had half an hour until the others were supposed to show up. Wally nudged Dick and said, "If you hurry, dude you can probably catch some Z's before we have to duke it out in front of the team."

"I'm way ahead of you," Dick said with a smirk and shoved Wally into the side of the chair, leaning against him, and then shoving him again several times.

"_Ow._" The moment Wally dared to think Dick had finished fluffing him, Dick moved again, this time to push his head out of the way so Dick could rest _his_ head in the crook of Wally's shoulder. There was a brief moment of stillness until a discontent huff escaped in a puff of air across Wally's collar bone and Dick began alternately tugging on and hitting his shoulder. At this point Wally felt he had let the jostling go on long enough and said, "Dude, quit it!"

Dick sat up and lowered his eyebrows at Wally. "I'm trying to get comfortable okay? You aren't exactly a tempur-pedic pillow."

"I _know_! Stop treating me like one, or I'll treat you like a stupid ugly baby and rock you to sleep!" Sometimes when Wally thought about the things that he said _after_ he said them, he wished, for the briefest of moments, that he didn't have superspeed; or at least that it didn't affect his ability to process his thoughts before vocalizing them.

Dick stared at him for a moment wearing an expression that Wally could only assume was extreme unease until it turned thoughtful and he said, "Actually, that-"

"No!" Wally said. "Go to sleep or don't, but please, for my sake, just pick one."

The pout on Dick's face swelled in his cheeks and Wally could see the tops of his deep blue eyes boiling beneath his sunglasses. He tried not to laugh and succeeded only because Dick pushed him so hard. Eventually Dick stopped fussing and did fall asleep, although barely ten minutes afterwards the zeta beam in the hangar beneath them began to whir.

Wally nudged Dick off of him and said, "It's go time, dude."

At first Dick seemed to be disoriented, his glasses slightly askew from leaning his temple against Wally's shoulder, but he perked up when Wally whined loudly, "So you're busy next weekend, too?"

Light, paced footsteps on the stairs meant that it was probably Kaldur who had arrived. Dick quickly righted his shades and said, "Sorry, Wally, I kind of am."

"So let's clarify then; when _are_ you free, Rob?" Wally gave him a gentle push out of the chair when Dick had trouble untangling his folded limbs from beneath him. He staggered forward into the table but managed to catch himself gracefully enough in time for Artemis to round the corner of the staircase.

"I told you, I don't know. Would you stop bugging me about it? I'll tell you when Batman tells me."

Out of the corner of his eye, Wally saw Artemis stop briefly at the edge of the lounge before wandering into the kitchen. He looked back to Dick and tried to sound gruff, "I'm your boyfriend-"

"Robin, Artemis, report to briefing room twelve immediately." Batman's voice cut Wally off, mocking his poor attempt at sternness with its practiced edge. Without even meaning to he locked eyes with Dick who shook his head just barely.

"We're finishing this conversation later," Dick said, his pointer finger hovering just inches from Wally's chest.

He knew that the proper reaction would probably have been to say something bitter and angry in response, but Wally felt like he was being choked so the only noise that ended up coming out of him was a quiet sort of whimper as Dick walked away.

Artemis shot him an expression of mild sympathy and followed after Dick, which left Wally alone in the lounge. He paced the area for several minutes (seconds, more like) before resolving to go for a run. Just because Batman had called them into a briefing room didn't mean they were being sent on a mission. Maybe Bat's just wanted to talk about non-meta things with them. He did that sometimes...

Wally sighed loudly and all the air in his lungs seemed to fall out of him and fill the room. He sucked it back in and sped towards the cave entrance.

+o+o+o+

The soreness in Dick's muscles went as deep as his bones and he didn't think he could ever remember feeling this worn out except maybe twice in his life. Once when he _started_ his training with Batman, and once when Two-Face nearly beat the life out of him. He hadn't been required to perform on missions during either of those two times.

Dick had every intention of telling Batman that he wouldn't be able to function on the field in his current condition when he entered the briefing room with Artemis on his heels and Roy already waiting inside, arms crossed and leaning against the table. Batman stood to the left with several folders tucked underneath his arm. A holo-screen bearing the image of a middle aged man with black hair and outdated glasses illuminated the back of his bat-eared cowl. He looked decidedly superstitious and cowardly, hovering behind Batman like that.

The minute Dick and Artemis sat down, Batman started in on his briefing. "This is Sydney Happersen. He is Lex Luthor's chief lab rat and according to our intel, he's been put in charge of developing a serum designed to temporarily block the abilities of meta-humans and the more common earth-dwelling aliens, namely Kryptonians. Taken over a long period of time, the serum's effects become permanent." The screen flickered and three different building schematics replaced Happersen's scruffy face. "Luthor plans to market the serum publicly in the form an over the counter cough medicine called Debilium. As of now, it has yet to move onto human testing, so whether or not the serum has any effectiveness is still unknown but it goes without saying we can't risk sending meta-humans in to retrieve it which is why you three have been chosen to infiltrate Luther Technologies, retrieve a sample of the serum and bring it back here for further examination."

Batman tossed the manila folders under his arm onto the table and Artemis and Roy nearly fought each other to grab them. Dick rolled his eyes and took the one that was left.

"I've already sent the blueprints to your holocomputer, Robin, but you should _all_ try to memorize the building's structure before you get there. I expect this to be a _completely_ covert mission." Batman's eyes moved to rest on Roy behind the white lenses of the cowl. "That means no blowing _anything_ up. I don't care how flammable it is."

Roy managed the self-restraint not to make any outbursts besides a reproachful sounding, "What?"

Batman ignored him. "Any questions?"

"Yeah," Artemis said, her nose buried in the papers of her manila folder. "How are we getting there?"

"There's a zeta beam in Houston, several blocks away from the business district. The league decided to practice strategic foresight in the face of Lex Corp's more suspect branches. Something you should all learn to practice."

This time Roy took the bait and stood from his chair. It rolled several feet away from him in the fervor of his movement. "Are you trying to imply something, here?"

"Be ready and waiting in the hangar in three hours. You have until then to gear up and plan out security avoidance tactics. I've included helpful tips in your folders if you decide you need ideas. Robin, you're team leader."

"We're not in _pre-school_!" Roy declared to the retreating ripples of Batman's cape. "We don't need your little _tips_!"

"You know he's just goading you." Dick said, flipping open the folder. Pawning this mission off on someone else just became an unviable option. If they could avoid any confrontation, Dick was confident he could make it through without screwing something up or tripping over his own aching muscles again, but their timing would have to be perfect.

Roy huffed and moved to sit back down in his chair, however, upon seeing that it had moved too great a distance away, grabbed a closer one instead and collapsed in it. "Yeah, well... I'm not his stupid sidekick. He doesn't _goad _Superman."

"Yes he does," Dick looked up in surprise when he found his voice harmonizing with Artemis's.

She rolled her eyes at him and said, "Come on knuckle heads, let's figure out an entrance strategy, at least, before he comes back to give us a pop quiz."

+o+o+o+

Wally found him in his room while Dick was loading up his utility belt. His hair was windswept and his cheeks were pink from exertion. These things made it hard for Dick not to think about the sad puppy dog expression that spread across Wally's face when he said, "You can't go, dude. You're gonna get hurt."

Dick snorted. "No I won't."

"Let me go instead. Tell Bat's you've been puking or something."

"It's a non-metas only mission, Wally. I _have_ to go."

Wally's breath brushed the hair on top of Dick's head and Dick turned hesitantly around in his seat to look at Wally again. "Be _careful._"

"Who are you, my dead mother? I'm always careful." Dick shoved Wally's arm, and he stumbled back a step. The distance gave Dick enough peace of mind to return to his utility belt.

Wally snorted and put his hands on his hips which he had jutted in what was probably supposed to be an obstinate manner. Dick thought it looked more pre-teen sassy than obstinate. "I'm your best friend and I'm allowed to worry about you, okay?" He fell silent then added, "Also, don't make jokes about your dead mom. That's weird, Rob."

Dick shrugged and Wally hovered around him for several minutes until he had finished packing the pockets of his belt with enough knock out gas and tranqs to put a rhino in a coma. When Dick was ready to head out and it became clear that Wally's worry had not be resolved as he fluttered here and there like some needy humming bird looking for food, which, now that Dick though about it, pretty much summed up Wally's whole personality perfectly.

"Look," Dick sighed. "It's a stealth mission. As long as everything goes according to plan, we won't even have to fight."

"Nothing ever goes according to plan." Wally said and stared at Dick like Ms. West probably stared at _him_ when he ate out the whole kitchen.

"Okay, well in the event that it doesn't, I've got Artemis _and_ Roy to cover my back."

Wally seemed unconvinced by this.

"Is this how it's going to be now?" Dick said, raising an eyebrow. "We kiss a little and all of a sudden you want to lock me up like a damsel?"

Wally turned so red, his freckles disappeared into the blush on his cheeks and Dick laughed, twirling around him and out of the room before Wally could say something that might make him want to stay any more than he already did.

+o+o+o+

Houston greeted them with a humid wind. It rustled Dick's cape, crept into the fabric of his uniform and made the Kevlar beneath his vest feel twice as heavy as it really was. The moist air blanketed him like a heavy sweat. Every time Dick tried to pump himself up and pretend that he was operating at his best, the heat weighed him down and made him feel like he was running through quick sand.

"You think Lex Luthor keeps his labs air conditioned?" Roy asked, crouching next to Dick who was surveying the roof of Luthor Technologies through a pair of binoculars from the top of an adjacent building.

"Of course he does, idiot." Artemis' reply came from Dick's right.

He sighed and shifted his footing. "Actually guys, the air conditioning is probably going to go out with the security system. The whole building is designed to go into lock down the minute its systems are tampered with."

"Can't you hack around that or something?" Roy asked.

"I could, but the lock down actually makes things easier for us. Luthor Technologies' security is largely automated, and it's run by a single mainframe that controls the functions of the entire building." He lowered the binoculars from his face, staring at the roof across from them for any signs of movement. "It's coding resets itself every five minutes, so if I only hacked the security systems we'd be pretty short on time to get in and out, but If I can convince it that it's been infiltrated, it should shut down completely in an attempt to prevent information from being stolen from its database. This also shuts down all of the security systems and it takes the lockdown _half an hour_ to reset."

"But we really only have about fifteen minutes before Luthor's security personnel sweep the building." Artemis said.

"So this lockdown is only buying us ten minutes?"

Dick turned to Roy with a raised eyebrow that he probably couldn't even see behind Dick's mask. "Would you rather try to do it in five?"

Roy grumbled something under his breath that sounded like, "I'd _rather_ have air conditioning," but then sighed and leaned his hands against the rail of the rooftop. "Fine, let's do this, then."

Dick pocketed his binoculars while Artemis re-adjusted the shoulder strap on the air tight case Batman had given them for the samples. Roy pulled a grappling arrow out of his quiver.

"On three," Dick said, and each of them shot their grapples. They vaulted over the chasm between buildings until their feet met the reinforced concrete of Luthor Tech where they dangled over the side of the roof until Dick gave them the go-ahead to scramble up the edge and run the short distance to a hvac exhaust system that just barely shielded them from the prying eyes of rooftop surveillance cameras. Dick pulled out his holocomp as soon as they came to a stop and did his best to ignore the ache in his forearm while he typed.

The exhaust system rumbled behind them, its interior parts clanking together like coins in a clothes dryer. After several minutes the screen of Dick's holocomp flickered off and the exhaust system expelled a low declining whine. By the time the three of them had silently moved to the roof access door, it had ceased making any noise at all. A small charged explosive took care of the lock (since hacking the security codes were no longer a viable option) and Dick went in first, a map of the building open on his holocomp with Artemis and Roy following close behind.

Getting to the serum wasn't going to be the hard part. It was being stored in a clean room two floors below them, and once they made a path through, getting back out should be simple, but if they took even a minute too long getting there, or alternatively if Lex Luthor's army of security detail got to them before they could get out, it would be nearly impossible to escape unscathed, if at all. Dick tried not to think about it as they sprinted down the metal staircase until Dick caught a big black "27" painted on the wall and he held up his hand and said, "This is our stop."

Roy placed another charger on the door and they took cover on the staircase above while it went off. The stairs deposited them into a vacant hallway, lined with glass and ceramic tiled floors and Dick passed by four steel handled doors before he finally stopped. Another charger cleared their way but they had to get through two more rooms and another short hallway before they found themselves in front of the locked freezer that was supposed to contain the samples they were after.

Seeing as they couldn't just blow the door off the freezer, Roy and Artemis stood watch while Dick melted through the lock with a heated laser. It took time, too much time as far as Dick was concerned, but eventually the metal burned all the way through and Dick was able to - with a little help from Roy - pry the door open. The freezer was well stalked with samples, many of them duplicates and many more completely foreign - Luthor funded concoctions no doubt.

"What are all of these?" Artemis asked, peering over Dick's shoulder while she unlocked the case meant to transport their sample.

Roy leaned against the counter beside Dick, arms crossed. "Maybe we should take a few and find out."

"No. We only have enough room in the case for four samples and our mission is to retrieve this Debilium stuff, not rifle through Lex Luthor's medical cabinet." Dick pulled out a rack of culture tubes and handed them to Artemis. "By the way, Red," Dick turned to Roy. "If you're in here, who's keeping watch in the hall?"

"No one's coming. It's only been ten minutes."

Dick's eyes locked with Roy's at the same time that they heard footsteps pounding in the distance.

"What!" Roy said, throwing his hands up. "No one was coming!"

Dick turned to Artemis as she finished locking up the case. "Let's go."

They made it into the second room before the Luthor's men got to them and Dick should have known they wouldn't waste any time making introductions, but he reacted half a second too slow. Artemis and Roy were already behind one of the counter islands when bullets started flying and Dick wasn't far behind, but his arm gave out halfway through back flipping over the counter and he fell, knocking the back of his head against the corner of the island hard enough for him to black out while he tumbled to the ground. The next thing he knew, Roy had grabbed him by the arm and was dragging him back behind the safety of their cover while Artemis fired arrows into the fray.

"Nice one Boy Blunder," Artemis' voice floated over the ruckus of gunfire and whizzing arrows.

Dick focused on not screaming and said, "Sorry."

Next to him Roy grunted, "How hard did you hit your head?"

"Hard enough," Dick blinked until his vision began clearing and ignored Artemis in the background warning them that she couldn't hold these guys off forever. "But I'll be fine," he said, and riffled around his utility belt while he waited for his thoughts to re-organize themselves.

"Good because I just took a bullet for you."

"_What_," Dick's hands froze and he didn't move until Roy hit him in the arm.

"Forget it, just focus on figuring out a way to get us out of this mess."

It felt like swallowing molasses, but Dick pushed down the rising anxiety in his throat and pulled three smoke bombs from the left pocket of his belt, and one can of knock-out gas from the right. "You guys remembered your re-breathers, right?"

Roy was already pulling his out while Artemis muttered, "Trust me, I don't plan on ever forgetting _this _thing again."

Dick tossed the gas and smoke bombs over the counter. They all waited for the tell-tail hiss and then the fading sound of gunfire. It didn't stop completely, Dick was willing to bet a few of the men managed to get masks on before the knock out gas _knocked _them out, but hopefully the smoke would give them enough cover to get by, and with a little luck, no one else would get shot.

Artemis had to help Roy hobble to his feet and Dick saw the blood trickling from a hole in his thigh and winced. It was bleeding, but not enough that an artery had been nicked. Once they got a locomotion going, Roy seemed to be fine running on his own and Artemis and Dick took care of any men still standing in the smoke while Roy ran through, but there were still more coming.

Footsteps drummed behind them in the main hallway and Dick cringed at the sound of them gaining. Roy slowed them up on the stairs and Dick and Artemis had to take each of his arms and help haul him to the roof while he cursed and fought them all the way. Barely a floor below, Luthor's security team shook the metal stairwell.

The humidity hit them like a wall when they finally burst through the door to the roof. "Can you make it the rest of the way on foot?" Dick asked Roy once they let him down.

"Sure, it's not like there's a bullet in my leg."

"I said can you _make it_?"

"Yes, I can make it. Jesus."

Artemis appeared next to Dick, bow and arrow in hand. "Hey airheads, we have to go. That hardening foam isn't going to hold them forever."

Dick and Roy didn't waste time acknowledging her. They headed towards the edge of the roof at a sprint and grappled down the side of the building.

Running back to the zeta beam felt like running too fast through a dream. Dick wondered if running felt like this for Wally because he didn't think he had any control of his legs. They were just carrying him along at a pace he hadn't really bothered to set with Artemis in front of him and Roy pulling up the rear. Every few seconds Dick would look back to make sure Roy hadn't fallen behind, and he would receive a glare from Roy in return, as though Roy couldn't believe Dick would doubt him enough to even bother checking. Dick checked anyway.

When they finally entered the zeta beam, Dick didn't really care what happened next. He may or may not have collapsed on the floor of it, or immediately at the other end of it, he couldn't quite remember. All he knew was that the whirring lights of its interior were the most comforting things he had ever seen, and that he had screwed up, bad.


End file.
